Atlantis 27_3

ATLANTIS MAGAZINE FOR URBANISM & LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

#27.3 MARCH 2017

DIALOGUES EXPLORING TOOLS

FROM THE BOARD COMMITTEES 2017

Dear Polis Members,

We could not be as visible as we are without the great effort of a lot of active students. With the help of them we can organise excursions, lectures, workshops, drinks and events. The Polis board wants to thank all the people involved for their great efforts and positive input!

On behalf of the new Board and Committee members of 2017, we are humbled and excited to begin the new year. A big thank you goes out to the former Board and Committee members for their tremendous effort in 2016 and guidance in the beginning of this year. Their thorough effort and excitement has not only given us inspiration and determination, but has also created new opportunities for Polis and its members.

We are always looking for enthusiastic people to join.

Interested in one of the Polis committees? Do not hesitate to contact us at our Polis office (01.west.350) or by e-mail: contact@polistudelft.nl

The Board and Committees of 2017 plans to build upon the existing successful framework of the Polis by using our new theme of 'synergy' as an inspiration for our events and topics. We are especially keen to explore the synergy between the fields of Urbanism and Landscape Architecture.

URBAN AND LANDSCAPE WEEK ATLANTIS EDUCATION PR COMMITTEE BIG TRIP & SMALL TRIP

Preparations for Urban and Landscape Week 2017 is already underway to make the event even more interactive and exciting. The Big Trip & Small Trip Committee is planning two excursions for 2017 aiming to explore existing projects, and promoting interaction between our students and members of other universities. The PR Committee, as always, is keen to synthesize and promote our events to students and now extending to patrons.

POLIS BOARD Harsh Malhotra - Chairman Amanda Bryant - Secretary Daan Rooze - Treasurer Nilofer Afza Tajuddin - Public Relations Karishma Asarpota - Atlantis

We are excited to introduce ‘Dialogues exploring Tools’ as the third issue of Volume 27 from the 2016 Committee. We hope to follow through with Volume 28 in a similar manner exploring other avenues of urbanism and landscape architecture.

We are open to welcoming new enthusiastic faces to join us! For more information send us an e-mail or drop by our office for a quick chat or coffee.

Warm regards from the Polis Board 2017, Harsh, Amanda, Daan, Nilofer and Karishma.

BECOME A MEMBER Not already a member of Polis? For only €12.50 a year as a student of TU Delft, €30 for individual professional membership, or €80 for organizations you can join our network! You will receive our Atlantis Magazine four times a year, a monthly newsletter and access to all events organized by Polis.

E-mail contact@polistudelft.nl to find out more.

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ATLANTIS

EDITORIAL

MAGAZINE FOR URBANISM & LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

Atlantis Volume #27 Are you passionate about urbanism and landscape architecture and would like to contribute? Contact us at: atlantismagazinetudelft@gmail.com

The city is a complex reality of desires and fears, disguised rules and disparate perspectives. Amidst this, movements towards technological advancement, rise in migration, climate crisis for instance, brings forth an urgent requirement to update our methods to read and design for cities. Atlantis 27.3, titled ‘Dialogues Exploring Tools’, attempts to articulate a new action language for us to conceptualize and organize space.

Looking beyond the standard, functionalist design toolkit at our disposal - there is a realization that other relationships sustain the city’s life. Elements such as empathy, endurance, enthusiasm, trade, agency, conversation, fiction, poems, music and all other types of urban interactions can become tools for our practice- as effective as our conventional design methods. By doing so, our field of ‘action’ can react against a design of control, exclusion and segregation, thus speculating the personal position and creative role of the ‘Interdisciplinary Designer’. A new consciousness emerges, understanding the ‘tool’ as a dynamic network assuming different realities: as an object, an event, a performance or perhaps a craft.

The articles in the issue unravel the interpretations of ‘tools’ - in building new tales for the city, crafted by an intricate web of human connections and relations, as derived by our personal and professional choices at large. By going beyond the conventional design parameters, the articles explore unlikely confrontations and incidents that transform everyday life, as imagined in three sections - ‘action’, ‘object’ and ‘(re)action’.

Echoing this thought, Jere Kuzmanić spearheads the issue with an introduction describing the politics of desire, the choices we make and the collective responsibilities we need to serve, while engaging with certain tools. What drives us to make this choice? Marina Ðondraš uses disruption as an opportunistic tool for redevelopment of Miami, putting it in a relationship with contemporary culture, underlined by a common denominator - water. Other articles delve into the underlying dynamics of burglary and squatting, involving bodily experience as a tool in appropriating space, etc.

It engenders an awareness of networks which are disguised within the everyday, and encounters that offer multiple spatial perceptions of the city. The narrative constructed through all 15 articles seeks to remind that our profession is not just technical and selfcontained but is also a consequent expression of our deepest desires, of our wit, zeal, enthusiasm, ambitions and fears.

We thank Gaila Constantini for her radical eye for the bold and the vivid in portraying a powerful visual language for Atlantis - Volume 27.

With the future closer than ever, and our ever-expanding tool kit in place, the next and final issue of Volume 27 will deal with moving ‘Towards Uncertainty’.

Enjoy reading!

Editors-in-Chief, Shruti Maliwar, Kritika Sha

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CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION // 05 THE TRUE HISTORY IS THE HISTORY OF DESIRE

ACTION

//

07

MISAPPROPRIATING

SPACE

THROUGH

CRIME

SELINA

JERE KUZMANIC

ABRAHAM

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ARCHITECTURE OF APPROPRIATION RESEARCH DEPARTMENT OF HET NIEUWE INSTITUUT ( IN COLLABORATION WITH JERE KUZMANIC ) ÐONDRAŠ HENRIK

// 17 DISRUPTION AS A CATALYST FOR URBAN DEVELOPMENT MARINA

// 19 LISTENING THROUGH MACHINES TAUFAN TER WEEL // 23 CULTURE IN CRISIS // 25 ANALOGUES AND THE SOURCE BLOOD OF DESIGN RUIYING LIU

MOLANDER

OBJECT // 27 DANCING BUCHAREST ARTPAGE DANI IONIȚĂ // 31 BEHIND THE FRAMES MOVIE REVIEW ISABELLA DEL GRANDI IOANA IONESCU STEFFEN NIJHUIS

// 41 TALKING CURE PANOS KOUROs // 45 DIGITAL LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE // 49 THE TRAVELOGUE INTERVIEW WITH NURUL AZLAN BY ALEXANDRA FARMAZON

(RE)ACTION DIAKROUSI

COVER

// 35 LOOKING BACK, TOWARDS A TERRITORIAL CITY GRADUATION PROJECT

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// 55

53 BRING

COMPETITION

EMPOWERMENT BACK

OF

THE

//

MINISTRY?

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GENDER

VOICE

ANGELIKI

IJSBRAND

HEERINGA

SHORTLISTED

ENTRIES

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The true history is the history of desire Piet: I must be happy with what I am doing.

Ana M: We have to go beyond what makes us happy. Desires go beyond.

Piet: I don’t have desires.

Ana M: That is not political.2 Our tools are our skills.

To discuss tools we have to look at what comes before the profession, what drives us internally and externally.

To appropriate skills from other fields and practices (interdisciplinary urbanist), to accumulate (intelectual), to specialize (engineering) or to craft them (pioneering) might seem like a personal decision for each urbanist.

However, it could be argued that it is not so personal.

Are we moved by the values of what we do, or by the consequences of what we do? Political reality of our time is that our own sense of recognition, selfperception and self-actualization are not detached anymore from political struggles and the collective stumbling around us. It has indeed been like that since forever. Still, something did change that makes us intensively conscious of this. The future is closer than ever.

could fit in our room instead of where next we are going to live.

It makes us aware and anxious about this input in our personal decision making. This can be brought forth in 5 main topics: environmental crisis on global level, automation that reduces need for paid labor, political shifts of power aka, social underdevelopment of humanity au contraire incredible technological expansion of horizons, unprecedented migration of humans in all directions but predominantly into cities and finally perception of personal role within all these larger movements. Even though this last topic grows like a seed out of all others, it is least discussed as a professional issue. However, there are some things that still seem to be in our hands. With Chinese companies already printing 10 houses a day with one 3d printing machine, we should already be imagining small architectural offices being replaced by userinterfaces that are enabling the final user to customize his own house without any help of the architect (do you remember SIMS?). Or while watching the news about thousands of Syrians wandering around Europe until they bump into someone who understands that migration is not a personal choice but a force of social interaction; we should think of how many people

Choice of our goals is political. Choice of our role is political. Our income is political. The intrinsic motivation to create is political. We have to be ready to substitute security of job for continuity of values.

Addressed to city councils, on the entrance to the hall of the Major Council in Rector’s Palace of the ancient Republic of Dubrovnik, was inscribed: Obliti privatorum, publica curate. 'Leave behind your private issues, serve the common ones.' Only this way our skills will become meaningful and our tools will stay firmly in our hands. Engagement with the reality of our time starts with personal but goes beyond-to collective, to global, to environmental, to interpersonal etc. In Guattari's words: The true history is the history of desire. •

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by

Jere Kuzmanić

MSc Student, Urbanism TU Delft

Humans have a great need to build boundaries but not so much to remove them and unfortunately these boundaries are often not symbols. They are real.

Parceling of power is the footprint of our civilization.

As urban planners we are engaging with cities that are a result of human lust for power, amongst other things. Statuses, Roles, Habits and Institutions are already drawn on every map, and space and reality are shaped by them. Our physical/virtual or existential/ social micro location in this parceling is the firmest trace we'll see drawn. So in order to define the role of our profession within the big challenges first of all position has to be brought to consciousness. A personal position. And personal became political.

References 1.Guattari, Felix, Chaosophy, texts and interviews 1972-1977, Semiotext(e), Los Angeles, 2009 2.Informal conversation between Piet Vollard and Ana Mendez de Andes, both former architects today active creators of different urbanity. Ana is core member of social movement that became part of city government in Madrid and Piet is one of the creators of City in the making platform in Rotterdam.

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1. Manifestation on November 2016 in Piazza Verdi, Bologna, Italy © Miloš Costantini

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Misappropriating Space through Crime Coinciding with a recent visit to Berlin, I came across an article describing a series of escape stories in the context of the Berlin Wall that peaked my interest. One such story, (von Hardenberg, 2009) set in the backdrop of 1983 Soviet occupied Berlin, a young German national, Holger Bethke found himself under surveillance by the Soviets following the escape of his brother Ingo to West Berlin. Forced to speed up his own imminent liberation, Bethke carefully planned an escape. Backed by weeks of archery training, he chose a street in Treptow park where the death strip was narrow, accompanied by tall houses on either side. Using his newfound archery skills, Bethke shot an arrow across the death strip and on the other side of the wall, where Ingo waited in a house in West Berlin's Neukoelln district to firmly fasten the line. Holger zip-lined along to other side, securing his freedom from communist Berlin.

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by

Selina Abraham

MSc Student Urbanism, TU Delft

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Cities are full of such physical artefacts with specific designated functions and of varying political meaning.

Some with drastic political implications, like the Berlin Wall and some with a lesser impact, like the regulation of a threshold by a locked door or gate. Despite these defined constructs, inhabitants of the city often find ways to re-appropriate the built environment to their own convenience. Sometimes this is done by the misuse of physical space.

In Burglar’s Guide to the City, Geoff Manaugh attempts to chronicle one such chapter of the city through multiple stories set over various cities. As the title implies, the book accounts the city through a crooked perspective, filled with narratives of forced entry into buildings. Manaugh is very thorough in his narration, he considers burglary through the morphology of the city, through the legal implications, through perspectives of the law enforcement, the perpetrators, and their victims. Where he falls short, is that the book is a purely Western chronicle. But this could be a reflection on Manaugh’s biography.

Manaugh is a writer and an essayist who curates a popular architecture blog, BLDGBLOG. He was previously the senior editor of Dwell and a contributing editor at Wired UK. And the former director of Studio-X NYC, an urban think tank and event space at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation and is currently serving as a “Discovery Fellow”, in his own words, at the University of Southern California Libraries in Los Angeles. (Manaugh, 2004) In Burglar’s Guide to the City1 he looks at the city as interface of misuse. As urbanists and planners we present our projects as a consequence of its network of movement patterns, public spaces and physical infrastructure. (Manaugh, 2016) But, many a time, we neglect to comprehend the possibilities and the ways space can be mis-appropriated.2 The book sheds a light on various morphological aspects that determine the type of crime in a city. For instance, Los Angeles is spread out horizontally, where everyone is dependent on the automobile, including the burglars making

" It is an explicitly spatial crime: [...] to commit burglary you must cross some imaginary border, or invisible plame, and enter another clearly defined architectural space - a volume of air, an enclosure - with the intent of committing a crime..." their escape. The massive freeways give you quick access and a quick escape. Stories of burglaries in LA always include a getaway car. A city like New York on the other hand, is dependent on the subway. A New York burglar would have to make his getaway through public transport and banking on the anonymity of a crowd of commuters. The city also impacts retaliation by law enforcement, the Los Angeles Police Department has a dedicated Airport Support Division to combat crime. Building codes can also be manipulated by trespassers to their benefit.

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The book recounts the story of a reformed burglar from Toronto, Jack Dakswin. Building regulations and fire codes can define the inside of a building, a close study backed by a visual understanding of the building exteriors helped Dakswin predict infiltration and escape routes. A blueprint with the location of fireescapes, distances to the near exits are invaluable tools to a burglar. The book is filled with similar musings on the spatial impact of burglary.

Further, Manaugh remarks on the exclusively spatial nature of burglary. Architecture exists and therefore does burglary. But he also acknowledges that the theft of property and the means to commit it are changing. This is not due to a technological change

alone, but also a change in culture. We are entering a cashless age with the advent of electronic wallets, and the rising popularity of debit and credit cards.

But this is coupled with new trends in our approach to materiality. A new generation is emerging that is not bogged down by physical items and are disconnected from their value. If a burglar chose to break into my apartment, the only thing of personal value is a laptop, a camera and my passport. Though this could be exclusively a student perspective, but even at times of personal economic prosperity from my past, I would have declared the same items of value. Burglary in a small scale is perhaps a dying art form. In this day and age hacking bank accounts would reap more rewards.

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1. Cover - Burglar's Guide to the City, Design by Nayon Cho. Copyright - Geoff Manaugh 2. Architecture exists and therefore does buglary.

Image Source - Getty Images. Available Online https://assets.wired.com/ photos/w_1920/wp-content/ uploads/2016/04/BurglarHK0643-001.jpg 3-4. Tschumi, B. (1994) Manhattan Transcripts Source: http://www.tschumi.com/ projects/18/ 5. Tschumi, B. (1981) Advertisements for Architecture.

Source: http://www.we-findwild-ness.com/2010/12/ bernard-tschumi-advertisements-for-architecture/

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One of the most interesting reflections in the book is Manaugh’s observations on Bernard Tschumi’s work on space and crime. In the early 1980s, Tschumi wrote (Tschumi, 1981), “to really appreciate architecture, you may even need to commit a murder” supplemented with an image of someone thrown out of a tall building. The building here would be an accomplice in the crime.5 He further elaborated on this theory with a project called the Manhattan Transcripts (Tschumi and Young, 1994)3-4 detailing out a fictional murder in Central Park. In a contemporary conversation with Manaugh, Tschumi implores the profession on the need to rethink traditional architectural representation. Architects need to uncover the complexity of the city through their drawings, communicate the events that may transform their spaces. Tschumi says, an architectural drawing of a bank heist would be difficult, but not impossible.

As urbanists, we have to look at our spaces and cities with representation of riots, revolution, overthrowing a government or even merely to commit a crime and not merely people in periods of stability.

Complex and extensively researched, I have little to be critical of Manaugh’s work. Some of his anecdotes are at times disconnected and it becomes hard to follow his narrative, this is despite being categorized under sub-chapters. And while all the topics that Manaugh addresses had my interest peaked, he lost me at a chapter on the tools of the trade. While perhaps relevant, I did not feel that the topic merited an entire chapter. This may however be attributed to a personal disinterest in lock-picking than a generic reflection. Another thing that did annoy me was the use of a silhouette caricature of a burglar as page breaker. Though endearing on the cover, it had a rather frivolous tone as a divisional layout device. But I do acknowledge that I am being petty here.

As Manaugh concludes, he recounts how his interest in burglary and the resultant research made him more attuned to certain aspects of public space. For instance, the location of surveillance cameras and security guards or studying people in queue at the bank. It made me reflect on how everyone has their own representation of the city. Having lived in a city with a high crime rates, I find myself very attuned to footsteps and shadows late at night. As an architect, I am often engrossed by design details, proportion of space, massing and the use of materials. Drivers often perceive cities as the shortest and least traffic congested routes. And burglars, they have a rather unique perspective, a way to infiltrate and escape the city. Manaugh articulates this very comprehensively in his manuscript and I recommend it to anyone interested in an alternative perspective on the built environment. The title of the book, A Burglar’s Guide to the City though catchy, does the work an injustice, it is a comprehensive account of the manipulation and the subsequent consequences of the built environment and not merely what the name implies. •

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"...the inability to represent events in space remains a fundamenal weakness in architectural thinking..."

References Manaugh, G. (2004) About. BLDGBLOG. Available at: http:// www.bldgblog.com/about/.

Manaugh, G. (2016) A Burglar's Guide to the City. Macmillan.

Tschumi, B. (1981) 'Violence of Architecture', Artforum, 20(1), pp.

44-47.

Tschumi, B. and Young, R. (1994) The Manhattan Transcripts.

Available at: http://www.tschumi.com/projects/18/ Von Hardenberg, D. (2009) 'Escaping the East by any means - A look at ten of the most dramatic escapes.', Available: www. aljazeera.com. Available at: http://www.aljazeera.com/ focus/2009/10/200910793416112389.html.

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Architecture of appropriation 11

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What opportunities arise when the right to affordable housing, working and living takes precedence in the transformation of the city? Since the 1960s, squatters have practiced this philosophy as a form of urban living, reshaping both the city itself and how it has been perceived and theorized. Using subversive spatial tactics instead of master plans and top-down design strategies, squatters appropriate the city and change it from within.

By making vacant buildings and sites fit for living and inhabiting them collectively, squatters offer an alternative to market-oriented urban policy and address issues such as vacancy, property speculation and housing shortages. To acknowledge the influence of squatting on the contemporary Dutch city Het Nieuwe Instituut has launched a long-term research on squatting as an architecture of appropriation.

The exhibition Architecture of Appropriation, that takes place from 27 January until 25 June 2017, illuminates squatting as a tool for radically autonomous spatial production from various perspectives. The tactics of squatters themselves are explained through the protocols they follow in carrying out their spatial interventions. In addition, the exhibition charts the history of spatial transformations brought about by squatters in five Dutch case studies.

The article will revolve around these two perspectives: logistical and spatial. The exhibition includes efforts of architect Hein de Haan, photographer-artist Dave Carr-Smith and finally an intervention by ZUS. The exhibition here, is as a motivation to re-discuss the question of ‘who is allowed to change the city?’

by

Research department of Het Nieuwe Instituut, Rotterdam

In collaboration with Jere Kuzmanić

MSc student, Urbanism, TU Delft

structure and condition of the building? Is it safe to occupy the building?

3) Mobilizing supporters Because of the complexity of squatting and the required experience, plans are discussed and reviewed with a network of reliable and experienced squatters or supporters. Sometimes the knowledge is passed through squatting information centers (KSU) that are publicly open monthly or weekly.

With whom can the proposed plans best be realized?

Are there other parties that have their eyes on the selected site? What skills are needed to take possession of the site and establish the squat?

Squatting – a spatial intervention in seven steps

"...Using subversive spatial techniques instead of master plans and top-down

Over the years, successive generations of squatters in various parts of the country have pursued their ideals using their own methods, although most of them have largely adhered to the following protocol. The ban on squatting has not significantly altered this situation.

design strategies, squatters appropriate the city and change it from within."

1) Finding vacant buildings A survey of unoccupied buildings in a city or region is carried out by cycling or walking around and asking neighbors or familiar locals for information about potential locations. It is determined whether the resulting list of 'unoccupied properties' corresponds with the intended goals of squatting group, such as establishing a living group, preserving a heritage site or creating (sub)cultural infrastructure.

Where does urban transformation lead to high levels of unoccupied buildings? Is there a neighbourhood conflict in need of support? In what type of space can the intended goals best be achieved?

2) Researching vacant buildings A 'forensic' investigation into a selection of buildings is carried out. Their structural condition and legal status is examined, and the social context charted.

Is the space in question truly vacant? And for how long? Who owns it? Why is the property not been used? Are there plans for its future? What is the

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Quonset hutQuonset hut

Yurt / Ger Yurt / Ger

Open shed Open shed

Partitions Partitions shed shed

Site office Site office

Trailer

Trailer

Quonset Quonset hut hut

Yurt / Ger Yurt / Ger

Container Container

Caravan

3 Caravan

4) Preparing the squatting action the owner, police and judicial authorities through a An ‘assembly point’ is chosen at an address close to lawyer, trying to ensure the continuation of the squat.

The same goal is pursued by seeking publicity or the intended location. A breaking crew, indoor crew and police liaisons are appointed. A press release and conducting a political campaign. letters for mobilization are printed and distributed, in the neighborhood as well. Materials and tools for How can an object be made suitable for the intended Site office Site office Trailer barricades and initial renovation work are gathered. Trailer programme?

Is the position of the squat strong or weak? How can a site be held for as long as possible?

An occupation roster for the first two weeks is drawn up.

How can the solidarity received be 'repaid'?

How many people are needed to set up the squat?

7) Beyond the squat Is it possible to go from the assembly point to the Often the owner at some point instigates legal proceedings, after which a judge usually demands selected location unseen? Who does what? What communication channels are used during the squatting the departure of the squatters. They either depart action? What action is to be taken if the police voluntarily or wait to be evicted by a police anti-riot escalates the situation? squad. In some cases, however, the squat acquires Container Caravan Container Caravan a ‘legal status’ if a user, rental or sale agreement is reached with the owner. The squatters must then 5) The squatting action Those involved gather at the agreed time and place, comply with structural and financial requirements of often on a Sunday. With a minimum of 30 squatters, such an agreement. the group sets off for the site on a predetermined Typology Typology Catalogue Catalogue ADMare1:200 ADM 1:200 plans for the building? Is the route. The breaking crew opens the door while the What the owner’s owner of legalization? Is legalization others shield them. The indoor crew inspects the 2 1 to2the 5midea5m 1 open interior for any unexpected situations. The lock in line with the ideological framework? What defence is replaced. The lawyer, neighbors and media are is put forward in any legal proceedings? Is opposition informed. to the eviction possible and appropriate?

Is the situation inside as expected? Is the object habitable and safe? How do the police and neighbours react? Which space can be made fit for habitation first? What renovation work must be carried out straight away?

6) During the occupation The continued occupation of a squatted site is the spatial embodiment of both a form of political action and a punishable offence. Rudimentary renovation work makes the building suitable for habitation and occupation. Lines of communication are set up with

Squatting in the Netherlands In the run-down centres of Dutch cities of the 1970s and 1980s, squatting developed into a widespread social movement that took over homes, buildings and sites on a considerable scale. Despite the squatting ban that came into effect in 2010, it still occurs, although on a limited scale, and the high degree of institutionalization that distinguishes the Dutch situation from the more isolated and improvised practices elsewhere in the world still exists.

Most squats are evicted again after a period, but

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Typology Catalogue Typology C ADM 1:200 ADM 1:20 1

2

15m 2

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4 Ground floor Axonometry with added walls

over the years a considerable number of them have acquired legal status and, accordingly, have survived as live-work complexes, concert venues, or cultural 'free zones'. Together with the many buildings designated as site of national heritage, and neighbourhoods that have been spared demolition thanks to the efforts of squatters, they constitute the spatial heritage of the squatting movement.

In addition, the spatial ideals championed by squatters, such as the transformation of vacant premises, reuse of construction materials and collective living and working at building or neighbourhood level, have greatly influenced our thinking about the city.

Such ideals initially surfaced in municipal policies for ‘building for the neighbourhood’ and establishing ‘cultural breeding grounds’ (broedplaatsen). But over the years they were also adopted and appropriated by commercial parties in the form of collective private commissioning and anti-squat companies, and in the current focus on temporariness that is part and parcel of the contemporary city.

Architecture of Appropriation - case studies The exhibition in Het Nieuwe Instituut presented five case studies: ADM, Plantage Dok, Wijde Heisteeg 7, Vluchtmaat located in Amsterdam and Poortgebouw in Rotterdam. These squats were established at various points in time (early 1980s, 1990s, and after the squatting ban) and all still existed when this selection was compiled. The selection captures the diversity of motivations, tools, scales and story-lines that characterise squatting throughout Europe. The sites were squatted for various reasons, for example to house refugees, to set up a 'free zone', or to create a live-work facility. Some have been legalised as

temporary 'social management' projects or 'cultural breeding ground', while others are in fact still squatted.

In all cases, however, the existing architecture acquired a new purpose and was altered, changed and extended to accommodate new functions. Below we have expanded on three examples from the exhibition: Plantage Dok, Vluchtmaat and Poortgebouw.

Plantage Dok In the Plantagebuurt district of Amsterdam, there is a large building complex of former printing office built around a nineteenth-century church. In the early 1980s the complex was squatted briefly but soon evicted.

For some years it housed a school and it was lying vacant for a long time, before squatters took the opportunity to use the complex again in 1998. In the end the complex was purchased in collaboration with the city’s newly established Bureau Broedplaatsen (‘Breeding Ground Agency’) and taken ‘off the market’ by means of a leasehold construction.

Immediately after legalization, an extensive process of renovation started, with a focus on transparency and social interaction. Affordable studios, workshops and a café-restaurant were realized. The enclosed church was restored to its original condition as far as possible and has been in use since, as a venue for cultural events. Plantage Dok has developed into an important meeting place within Amsterdam’s subcultural scene.

Vluchtmaat In October 2015 a section of the refugee collective We Are Here squatted a generic office building on a remote business park beside Amsterdam's A10 ring road. We Are Here is made up of refugees who have

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1. Installation Architecture of Appropriation © ZUS, 2016 2. An Interior in Poortgebouw, 2016 © Johannes Schwartz 3. Catalogue of Typologies from ADM © Christiaan Weijers 4. Added Walls at Vluchtmaat © Maria Fernanda Duarte

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not (yet) received any official status in the Netherlands, but who cannot return to their country of origin either.

To highlight their situation, the group squatted the listed brutalist St. Joseph Church in 2012, dubbing it the 'Vluchtkerk' (‘Refuge Church’). Since then the group has occupied more than twenty sites across the city.

What is remarkable about De Vluchtmaat is that it is the only site occupied by We Are Here that was legalized shortly after it was squatted. A number of volunteers involved with the group set up Stichting Noodzaak, a foundation modelled on an anti-squat agency that offers a form of ‘social management’ for unoccupied buildings. The foundation signed a three year contract with the owner and divided the openplan office space inside the two-floor building into small rooms for the refugees (4-5). A number of spaces are let to creative entrepreneurs, who take collective responsibility for the costs of using the building.

Poortgebouw The Poortgebouw is an imposing building, with national heritage status, constructed over a main road in the Kop van Zuid district of Rotterdam. It was

designed by architect Van de Wall as the head office of the Rotterdamse Handelsvereniging.

The port authority moved out in 1977, but plans to turn the building into a brothel were met with resistance. After lying vacant for three years, the building was squatted in 1980. The squatters carried out maintenance work and made spatial interventions.

Over the years they added a wood workshop, photo darkroom, rehearsal space and stage, shared kitchens, bathrooms and living spaces. (2) The Poortgebouw became a renowned venue in the underground scene. It has enjoyed a legal status since 1984, with the residents initially renting the building from the city and later from private owners. Today, Poortgebouw’s 30 residents are organized into various working groups devoted to particular issues, such as building maintenance, activity, etc. The building is also home to a give-away shop, a weekly café and a bimonthly open podium for performances.

Is squatting a form of production of space?

Het Nieuwe Instituut recently acquired the archive of Hein de Haan (1943-2015), an architect who frequently collaborated with squatters and spent his whole career advocating the preservation of the

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5. Vluchtmaat, 2016 © Johannes Schwartz 6. Wijde Heisteeg ,2016 © Johannes Schwartz

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existing city, small-scale construction and a mixture of living, working and amenities. In 1981 De Haan cofounded CASA Architects, a cooperative architecture office that focused on urban renewal and was a senior lecturer in the Department of Urban Renewal and Management at Delft University of Technology.

As an architect he worked on building projects that closely involved residents and prioritized reuse. With Urban Resort, an organization that grew out of the squatting movement, he proposed the re-purposing of the Volkskrant building. Through intensive consultation with residents and with a minimum of means, De Haan succeeded in securing the survival of monumental buildings for the city and in realizing affordable living and studio spaces. He convinced owners, such as municipalities and housing associations, of the merits of new practices and laid a solid foundation for the policy of providing affordable workspace for young creatives and for the collective private commissioning of architecture.

Next to his efforts, from 1990 to 1997, and again from 2006 to 2008, the British artist Dave CarrSmith researched and documented four squatted industrial buildings in the centre of Amsterdam.

The findings of this extensive study are gathered in Improvised Architecture in Amsterdam Industrial Squats and Collectives, a visual documentation of the transformation of a former grain silo (the Silo), a type foundry (Tetterode), a storage warehouse (the Loods) and a canteen for dockers into remarkable livework complexes (Edelweis). His unique collection of photographs, descriptions and drawings of residents captures the spatial transformation of the ex-isting architecture. Squatters have added apartments, workshops and even whole houses to the large and simple, or sometimes labyrinthine industrial buildings.

The documentation compiled by Carr-Smith offers a remarkable glimpse of a city that provides space for an architecture of improvisation.

Efforts and stories of these two professionals were used to enrich not only the exhibition, but on top of that the perception of squatting as an intriguing act of unmediated production of space. Here space is taken literally, but also politically as a mediator of social change and a fertile field of imagination of different cities and homes.

The knowledge of the squatting community is fading from our generation due to strong pressure of the neoliberal paradigm and the retreat of the community.

Before squatting ends up archived as a ritual of some extinct tribe it is of importance to re-evaluate what squatting means for the Netherlands. Hopefully this exhibition will bring together stories of architects, artists and public figures that emerged from this environment, as well as inspiration to those who see this production of city as still potential in opposition to the growing simplicity of how the city is produced today. •

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3 1

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DISRUPTION AS A CATALYST FOR URBAN DEVELOPMENT What if a tool for development presents itself unintentionally and is disguised as a misfortune?

Throughout all of its history, Miami has shown to be resilient when it comes to major world events and natural catastrophes. The development and growth of the city we know now is a storyline of flourishing developments and rapid crash; every disruption has been taken as an opportunity to grow stronger. With water always being a strong narrator, shaping the development and culture.

In 1513, native Caribbean’s tricked European conquistador Ponce de Leon into leaving by telling him he should go to a new land, where they have heard he could find the fountain of youth. When he made his landfall there, instead of the fountain, he found friendly natives, a lot of water and marshlands covered in flowers. He called the land Florida.

investors building the coast up higher and denser for attraction. Water has always played an important role in the development, construction and culture of Miami.

In the post-war history of Miami it is best seen how the city has grown and shaped itself from the disasters and disruptions that it has faced.

The strong water related culture is visible from the Tequesta-natives that lived from water and dealt with constant flooding through heightened houses in the marshes, to the conquistadors that built their first defence settlement along the Miami river during Seminole wars, from the dredging of half of the everglades to create room for a city, to real-estate

After all the threats from war, missile crisis and other hostile forces overseas, bringing in a lot of immigrants years and years after, the city became a transnational city, with a big part of its residents having their roots in Latin America. There came a new input that affected Miami greatly. The positivity of its effects for the city is disputable, but Miami became a cocaine

17

by

Marina Ðondraš

MSc Student, Landscape architecture TU Delft

atlantisaction

3

hub and main attraction for drug cartels, mainly because of its location as a big port-city between the Americas.

Drugs were part of daily life, to the point where research showed that every inhabitant of Miami, young and old, could find cocaine traces on their hands from the money that they were using.1 The safety in the city deteriorated as crime-rates went up. But at the same time, the drug money brought a lot of investments into the city. Biscayne Bay waters were filling up with speedboats and recreational elements and its coastlines were starting to get shape with Brickel downtown developing its skyline and the city starting to thrive.

Meanwhile, the upcoming television series Miami Vice, took all the elements of this unfortunate city and unexpectedly changed its character, to a dangerous, but also cool, multi-cultural, exciting place, with a charm that had an impact so big, it brought in tourists and visitors by the masses. The character of the city in Miami Vice as this tropical, pastel-coloured, laid back place enhanced the importance of the protection of the typical South Beach art-deco buildings, pushing investors to renovate the already exhausted art-deco buildings from the ‘30s, that were initially supposed to be torn down.2 At this time the city of Miami is facing another big challenge, it has a drastic change to look forward to. The city is globally one of the highest risk areas in terms of coastal flooding, with limited solutions because of geomorphological and spatial context, lack of governmental support and fragmentation of the densely built up coastline. While, on the other hand,

4

"The travails of the recent years have given Miami a lot of pain. But they've also given it something elsea strength of character, a gritty resourcefulness and an ability to rebound from the worst kinds of crises, which is one of the city's most attractive qualities."

- T. D. Allman there is a boom in real estate development and a trend of rapid urban expansion like never before. The balance of these two seemingly contradicting trends will showcase the way we deal with the risk of climate change in this era, in the city of the future.

Because of the complexity of the problem, many are pessimistic about the future of Miami as we know it now. But they are forgetting the strength the city has gained from all that it has endured. Looking forward, with integral planning and accepting water as an element of vitality in the city, the urban growth of Miami is bound to become stimulating and something to pay close attention to.

Ponce de Leon might not have been tricked; the fountain of youth might still be found in Florida.

But instead of the classic interpretation, its secret of immortality may lie in the water that gives the city the strength to deal with disaster and re-arise stronger from its ruins. •

References 1. Drugs on everyone's hands. Miami Herald, 16 January 1985 2. Allman, T., D. (1988) Miami, City of the future. University press Florida

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1. The water as a means of living: Tequesta natives living from water in swampy marshlands. Collage by author.

2. The water as an opportunity: Florida's culture of dredging and land reclamation. Collage by author.

3. The water as a frontier: the beach displaying the threat of conflict. Collage by author.

4. The water as an opportunity: the beach as a tourist attraction. Collage by author.

atlantispractices atlantisaction

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Listening through Machines Signal processing and the production of space.

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A signal is the physical carrier of content and expression – it can be transmitted and processed, which we call signal processing. From the angle of physics, this may involve spatial transmission and diffusion, conversion and transduction, filtering (selection and masking), modulation, convolution, storage and reproduction of information, amongst others. It covers both time-continuous and time-discrete functions, analogue and digital signals, rhythms and algorithms. These processes are incorporated in almost all of our machines and installations (our tools) but function by means of a limited set of principles – abstract and concrete.

Accordingly, the apparent fundamental principles of the signal itself are being employed here as explorative tool, as way of listening – epistemological and ontological (waveform as abstract function of time and the physical oscillations of space and time).

The advancement of electronic and electromagnetic technology, and signal processing in particular, has radically changed the ways in which we experience, conceptualise and organise space and time. Complex models, diagrams or abstract machines1 and their concrete applications affect and have significantly transformed everyday life – in different ways, however, to a large extent depending on one’s access to, and control over these applications. This short text highlights some social and spatial implications of the contemporary machinery, but by no means intends to give a general overview. It rather focuses on the ways in which signal processing transforms habit, or everyday rhythm, as well as perception itself – and therefore social and spatial practice at large. " The electroacoustic process changes the ground rules for acoustic behavior, first of all, by changing the form of the sound’s energy from physical and mechanical to electrical, and second, by adding energy to it. The resultant audio signal, representing patterns of voltage in time, takes on the characteristics of electricity, for instance, the ability to travel with the speed of light, nearly a million times faster than sound! […]

Therefore, we can see that at its very basis, the electroacoustic process is not merely a simple extension of the capabilities of sound, but rather a fundamental transformation of how it works."2 Power As Barry Truax points out, signal processing requires electricity, additional energy to amplify and modify sound. For example, a concert hall amplifies and extends sound by means of its own material and spatial properties (materialisation, dimensions) and involves reflection or absorption, resonance and diffusion. Yet an electroacoustic system is powered externally, in constant need of electricity, and in return would be able to modify the spatial characteristics of a hall without changing its physical structure.

The reverberation of a hall, for instance, can be enhanced or reproduced by repetition (delay) and consequently these characteristics are bound neither to spatial limitations nor to context. In other words,

the certainty of a static or absolute acoustic space is replaced by an expanding, but less stable, relative sense of space. Some advanced electroacoustic systems enable the juxtaposition of spaces, projecting the acoustic properties of one onto the other – whereby the spatial properties do not need to correspond to one another.3 In addition, the adjustable properties, technically, can be programmed as a function over a specific time frame, and can be stored, retrieved and copied.

Similarly, real-time processes, as they developed from early telecommunication to contemporary mobile and locative technologies,4 or social media, allow for the superimposition and synchronisation of different spatio-temporal frames and tend to de-contextualise and re-contextualise at high rates – which also applies to the expanding, but exclusive, means of transport (mobility). David Harvey contextualised this ‘shifting relative space’ (dimensions, distances) or ‘time-space compression’ historically, and relates it to the emergence of more ‘flexible modes of capital accumulation’ accompanied by compatible forms of cultural practice – which is necessary for capitalist expansion, and in return further amplifies uneven development and social exclusion. 5 The particular rhythms by which these spatiotemporal frames articulate are designed, or programmed. They can be controlled by the algorithms of an operating system’s architecture, for example, and commonly are confined to the human body and its devices, physical infrastructure and environment. Moreover, it is important to note that these aforementioned technologies, the ubiquitous especially, enable external and centralised control while remaining flexible and diffuse – they may have a ‘dual-use’ function (intercommunication as well as control and surveillance) and therefore cannot be isolated from power relations or political and economic interests.6 This applies in particular to a context in which propagating real information, if it threatens certain interests, is systematically silenced or even violently muted.7 The clarity, of the tool itself 20

by

Taufan ter Weel

Architect, sound artist and researcher Guest teacher, TU Delft

illustrations

Isabella Del Grandi

MSc student, Architecture TU Delft

atlantisaction

and its underlying governance structure, is therefore a matter of the utmost concern, which applies to an ordinary device as well as a highly specific design tool.

Clarity Contemporary design tools improve their efficiency and expand their capabilities – from predominantly Euclidean and Cartesian to non-Euclidean geometries or topology, for instance, or from static (off-line) to real-time (dynamic, adjustable, adaptive) processes.

Hence the tools become increasingly more complex and interdependent (they require compatibility and updates). Therefore, such a machine, first of all, requires a division of processes, whereby particular data and methods are encapsulated into objects with restricted accessibility. This is also known as ‘encapsulation’ in the field of computer science and communication technology (object-oriented programming and telecommunication respectively) but expands to other areas, such as financial management.8 Encapsulation improves the efficiency of a system but also amplifies its exclusion mechanisms – it eliminates the irregular and incompatible. Access to the operational core (source code) as well as parts is selective and can be transformed only by those who are authorised to do so.

uneven development – the ownership and control of, or access to, the means of (communicative) production remain critical.13 Because it is precisely the production of space in which abstract models take concrete shape, the challenge for architecture and urbanism may be the ability to design and transform the operating systems of spatial practice, rather than merely adjusting the systems’ parameters within a predefined range – in other words, to recuperate the notion of an open-ended system. •

Notes 1. The general definition of ‘abstract machine’ is the abstract diagram of a computer; this conceptualisation is extended to any abstract model or diagram (whether it is mathematical, financial, socio-political, or else) that is reduced to functions and matters and therefore ‘independent of the forms and substances, expressions and content it will distribute’; Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, trans.

by Brian Massumi (London: Continuum, 2004 [1987, 1980]) p. 156.

2. Barry Truax, Acoustic Communication (Norwood NJ: Ablex Publishing, 2001 [1984]) p. 124.

3. Convolution reverb, for instance, allows to capture the acoustic properties of a space (the Impulse Response function) and to combine (convolve) it with a dry sound (for instance a voice captured by a microphone) which results in a signal that contains the sound as well as the acoustic space; this process of convolution is enabled by the Fourier transform, a method whereby a function

Similarly, a tool, system or object of concern is often conceived as opaque ‘black box’, which implies that its hidden internal process can be measured or defined solely by the difference between its input and output values (its transfer function) and presumes a measurable causal relation between input and output.9 This particular abstract model or diagram of a machine enables analysis of internal processes, which would otherwise remain invisible, yet excludes non-causal or non-linear relations and the unquantifiable (everyday life, social relations, community, context) – in spatial terms it becomes what Henri Lefebvre would call ‘abstract space’.10 The problem of incomprehension is to a large extent solved by improving the ‘userfriendliness’ of a tool’s interface, which often implies a reduction to a predetermined set of functions and parameters.11 In other words, the process becomes less transparent, the tool more opaque12 – which tends to restrain explorative potential and is vulnerable to manipulation.

Control

is expressed by a sum of sinusoids i.e. a complex waveform is divided into a sum of sine waves.

4. Global System for Mobile communication (GSM), General Packet Radio Service (GPRS), Global Positioning System (GPS), and Geographic Information System (GIS) and so forth.

5. David Harvey, The Condition of Postmodernity (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1990) pp. 201-323.

6. For more details, see Donia Jourabchi & Taufan ter Weel, ‘Intensive Territories: Politics of Amplification’ in Warsound | Warszawa, ed. by Krzysztof Marciniak (Warsaw: CCA Ujazdowski Castle, 2016) pp.

8-22; https://issuu.com/air-laboratory/docs/warsoundwarszawa_cca_ ujazdowski_cas.

7. Some well-known examples are Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, Julian Assange, Thomas Drake, amongst many others.

8. For example, see Dimitris N. Chorafas, The New Technology of Financial Management (Hoboken NJ: Wiley, 1992) p. 219; to extend this further, we may argue that this abstract notion translates into opaque decision-making, urban governance models, public-private partnerships, and transnational trade agreements.

9. This abstraction also relates to ‘input-output analysis’ in economics; see Wassily Leontief, Input-Output Economics (New York: Oxford University Press, 1966).

10. Henri Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution (Minneapolis: University of

In order to keep pace with the progress, we become more dependent on external or ‘prosthetic’ devices that expand, and to a certain extent become substitute for, our own capabilities and memory. Likewise, selection procedures, generative processes and decision-making can be outsourced to algorithmic processes and machines of artificial intelligence. The increasing dependency on machines and the decrease in clarity of their inner workings, which is inherent in their expanding complexity, may stipulate new typologies of uniformity, mechanisms of exclusion and

Minnesota Press, 2003 [1970]) pp. 23-44; as well as The Production of Space (Malden MA: Blackwell Publishing 1991 [1974]).

11. In regard to the user-friendliness of interfaces in computer music, see Achim Szepanski, 'A Mille Plateaux Manifesto', Organised Sound, 6:3 (2001) 225-228.

12. Regarding transparency or opacity of tools for architectural design, see Peter McCleary, ‘Some Characteristics of a New Concept of Technology’, Journal of Architectural Education, 42 (1988), 4-9.

13. See Raymond Williams, ‘Means of Communication as Means of Production’ [1978] in Culture and Materialism: Selected Essays (London: Verso, 2005).

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1-2. Conceptual collages about sound machinery. © Isabella del Grandi, 2017

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Culture in Crisis

- Its future in a post-Welfare society On the first of January 2013, the Dutch government completely stopped its subsidy to the Netherlands Music Institute (NMI) and consequently terminated its operation as an institution for collecting, maintaining and distributing the Dutch musical heritage in the form of thousands of musical prints such as scores, notes and manuscripts. The Dutch composer and pianist Louis Andriessen stated that the Dutch government had declared war on music and that the fascists regimes of the 20th century respected music more than the Dutch government of today.1 Louis van Gasteren, movie director and artist, declared the severity of the situation by saying that Dutch culture, both contemporary and that of the past, has been “flushed down the toilet�. 2

The diminished support from the government is not exclusive to NMI. In the years following the financial crisis in 2008, the government led by Mark Rutte, decided to lower the support for culture by ca. 25%3 Many culture institutions in the Netherlands have been affected by these dramatic cuts resulting in organisational changes and downsizing. Subsequently, voices have been raised, protesting that this

government act is a serious threat to the diversity and quality of music, dance and art.

While the Rutte government is pressuring the culture sector to be increasingly self-reliant in terms of financing, the right wing populist Geert Wilders wants to completely stop all governmental funding towards culture.4 The reluctance to spend money on the arts 23

by

Henrik Molander

MSc Student Architecture, TU Delft

atlantisaction

has, however, not always been the attitude of the government.

Traditionally, the Dutch state has played an important role in keeping the landscape for the performingand visual arts both rich and diverse. In the 60s and 70s, the heyday of the welfare state, part of the democratization process of society was to provide means for the citizens to be socially and intellectually informed. To achieve this goal, art, in all its forms was deemed the right and proper tool. To make art reach out to the masses, new culture centers were built all over Europe. These centers were tangible manifestations of the new democratic culture and were supposed to let the public not only see but also take part in exhibitions and performances. When entering a culture center, you were no longer supposed to be a mere consumer but a true citizen, taking part in the current cultural discourse. The political and social message in culture centers such as Kulturhuset in Stockholm, The Southbank Centre in London or De Meerpaal in Dronten was fundamental for their existence but even though the political policies have changed over the years these buildings continue to play an important role as non-marketed public spaces.

The idea of culture as an important factor in the creation of better societies is however, not unique to the idealistic city planners of the welfare state, but is also present today.

In the fall of 2016, UNESCO published the Global Report on Culture for Sustainable Urban Development. The report is a 304-pages manifesto on the importance of culture for the creation of more creative, inclusive and sustainable cities. Cultural activities and initiatives are considered to be vital tools for communication in the increasingly diverse cities of today and cultural heritage means identity and belonging. These rather vague and worn out phrases are luckily illustrated by a myriad of case studies from all over the world where culture, in different shapes and forms, has been contributing to the quality of peoples' lives. The examples mentioned range from large scale projects, aimed to sustain traditional ways of living, to music festivals initiated by local musicians and artists.

One specific case is the transformation of a prison in Valparaiso, Chile into a center for music, dance and theatre. The new center has been successful in engaging the public and prompting local culture, for example, through a 900-meter-long mural dedicated to the Chilean Nobel prize winner Pablo Neruda.

When the Dutch government is,“flushing culture down the toilet”, the effect, according to UNESCO, will give us less creative, inclusive and sustainable cities. So, what can be done to prevent such a gloomy vision of times to come?

matters worse, the government and municipalities are reluctant to give out any subsidies if you are unable to show a solid business model and financial self-reliance in the long run. Creating opportunities for artists to improve their skills as entrepreneurs could be a step in making the creative sector increasingly financially autonomous. Physical meeting places that can serve as artist studios and at the same time as office hubs offering business support is a way to integrate creative practise with entrepreneurial development. A creative business hub can also function as public space where artists and institutions like the NMI can find a new home and make their presence known to the city.

Through the power of the collective, each artist can reach out to a bigger audience.

The culture centres from the “welfare state” are often located in city centres which makes them easily accessible for large groups of people. For culture enterprises, low on cash, the prime real estates in the most central parts of the town are not as easily accessible.

Culture venues such as smaller spaces for concerts or galleries are often forced to move out to fringe areas of the cities, while the city centres are devoted to retail and office buildings. Due to the financial crisis and shifting demands from corporations, there are around 8,5 million m2 of vacant office space in the Netherlands today. Office buildings in city centres are potential candidates for new types of culture centres / creative business hubs, and by utilizing these buildings, new life can be brought to the street and different forms of culture practices like concerts, exhibitions and workshops, to reach more people.

Current initiatives such as Stad in de Maak (described in greater detail in Atlantis 27.1) are transforming vacant properties in Rotterdam and giving them back to the community through creating space for housing, residency for artists, workshops and public space. By using the money generated from residency and office space, as well as utilizing the idea of sharing economy through exchange of services, the lower floors are made available for public use. A property owner corporation has, free of charge, given Staad in de Maak the possibility to manage vacant properties for a 10-year period. Transformation projects like these are still experimental and temporary, but the initiative could provide possible solutions to get less profitable venues for music and art back to the city centers, and consequently give room for a more diverse culture landscape. •

Notes 1.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiPC2H58Cc4 2.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkvTYIMYLWo 3.http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-19490501

A big challenge for many culture organisations and artists is a lack of entrepreneurship. To make

4.https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2012/08/30/pvv-vergeet-dekunstsubsidies-te-schrappen-1147451-a58136

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1. Stockholm Kulturhus ©Author

atlantisaction

Analogues and the Source Blood of Design Mindspotting of urbanism designers Birds, tulips, hands and knees—the creative process of designers/planners are full of analogies and metaphors. Often they are not to be discussed except to be caped around the design portfolio for theatrical effects, or tucked away with entertaining anecdotes along with napkin sketches. In doing this, our field has not done right by designers nor design...

The core of design is extracting, accumulating and applying knowledge of forms (Roozenburg, 1993; Tzonis, 1992). But in reality, there are infinite forms and combinations of them, so, how is the job done—by human designers?

When I searched for a way to learn as much as possible in the final act of my master education, I decided the best way is to extract the knowledge from the experts right in our midst. So I chose to do a thesis on metaphorical and analogical (M-A) thinking in urban design and planning, and studied the designers/ planners in the urbanism department by interviews.

M-A thinking is how the human mind transports old knowledge into the realm of new situations (Holyoak & Thagard, 1996; Lakoff & Johnson, 2008). If the challenge of design thinking is infinite form variations, could this be the key component in “how the job is done”?—Extending, stretching, and testing the old concepts in new situations, with one foot on firm ground and the other poised for a leap ahead? If so, where do the experts draw their strength to make the leap, and how do their sources shape their trajectories?

P. B.—Zen and the Art of Interfacing His random sketches during the interview reveal a profound naturalist tendency: cocoon, tulips, trees, etc.

In his leisure time, he paints trees like marshmallows and zen-ish abstract symbols. “I see myself as the urban designer who facilitates the conversation and collaboration among other professionals with a spatial framework... also, while some designers like bold patterns that break the silence, I’m more of a harmonising tendency.” —Indeed, complexity and harmony is the hallmark of nature.

L. B.—The Crystal Mind At first look there is no metaphor or analogy in his portfolios, which are filled with pages and pages of arduous combinatorial calculation. But a second look reveals that all the symbol computation traces back to a long-standing personal quest linked to one metaphor, whose influence manifests throughout his many finished and unfinished projects. “The pyrite represents for me the crystal clarity of human mind seated within the rich and chaotic world.”—So his is

by

Ruiying Liu

MSc Urbanism Student TU Delft

the pursuit for transcendental perfectness, set against the organic jungleness of the physical reality.

F. C.—The Form Handler Just like the way he speaks, his sketches are very intuitively relatable. Hand, knee and boxes—the random examples he gives all happen to be objects with which we have direct experiences of bodily interaction. Given theories of embodied cognition (Lakoff & Johnson, 1999), it’s not far-fetched to say that designers conceptualise the agency of shaping and organising large-scale spatial entities by imagining them to be something “shapable”—that is, objects that can be physically handled.

F. P.—The Landscape Poet Unlike the flat and fragmented city, landscape harbours in it multiple perspectives: we experience walking in it as well as directly seeing it as a whole.

An intuitively cross-scale concept, with conceptual simplicity and spatial complexity, it is a perfect sandbox for urban designers to construct their mental models for cities. But more than functionality, it is poetic: it attracts good intentions to the mind’s surface despite problematic urban conditions. 36 years ago, F. P. conceived of the metaphor rivers–mountains– islands. “It was the first time I felt my mind set free.”—And it has been free ever since.

1.-1A. Design of a house to be seated in any diverse context 1B. Original inspiration of the pyrite representing artificial clarity in contrast with nature.

1C. The symbol computations of spatial division combination

E. B.—Master Narrator Her M-A examples are tiny seeds of narratives: to present a situation, and to suggest a direction to search for solution. “They let me reflect on what happens in my own thinking as well as help the clients see the situation.” So how do you capture the narrative of a situation? The answer, as proven by all writers is a complicated one if not all together a professional secret; still, E. B. has revealed something for me: four out of five, the analogues are animated beings—beings with independent agency. Such analogues already have the makings of an intriguing story.

2. Tulip and TOD structure conceived with the tulip analogy - the railway as the stalk, and the development fans out surrounding it.

2A. Wind turbines integrated into the landscape, interpreted as trees.

2B. A house made with a cocoon analogy would take up its qualities - enclosed, tight space inside, etc.

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In the Image of Pyrite (by L. B.)

1A

1

1B

1C

Analogues of a naturalist (by P. B.)

2

2A

2B

Spatial design as handling forms (by F. C.)

3

M-A thinking has profound influence on many levels of design activities, but they are idiosyncratic and difficult to evaluate. They serve various purposes and build on analogues drawn from personal knowledge.

This is seen by many as huge contributor to the irrationality of design —a problematic aspect to be purged. In my research I have come to see it differently — through its study, we can reveal the nature of the object of design as well as sharpen our tools to deal with it. • Names of the interview subjects have been replaced with initials — Can you guess their identities?

Write to atlantismagazinetudelft@gmail.com with your answers.

3A

3B

The Landscape Analogues (by F. P.)

4A

4

Narrating Stories of Space (by E. B.)

3. The planning concept of Amsterdam as a hand.

3A. Concept of joining space that handles interchange of two separated areas.

3B. Design for a recreational island; the “boxes” are sports grounds shielded from the wind by trees.

4. The city seen as a landscape context 4A. The site seen as situated within a landscape context

My thesis is being done under the guidance of Egbert Stolk and Frits Palmboom. It is also part of the research on complexity, cognition and the city (cccity.weblog.tudelft.nl).

References Holyoak, K. J., & Thagard, P. (1996). Mental leaps: Analogy in creative thought: MIT press.

5

Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1999). Philosophy in the flesh: The embodied mind and its challenge to western thought: Basic books.

Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (2008). Metaphors we live by: University of Chicago press.

Roozenburg, N. F. (1993). On the pattern of reasoning in innovative design.

Design Studies, 14(1), 4-18.

Tzonis, A. (1992). Huts, ships and bottleracks: Design by analogy for architects and/or machines. Research in design thinking, Delft University

5B

Press, Delft, Netherlandspp, 139-164.

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5C

5. Rotterdam Zuid as a fish portrays the essence of local spaces by assigning them meanings found in its body 5A. Helmond as a lady with flowery hat narrating the complementary relation between the city and its surrounding villages.

5C. Zoetermeer as a spider in the web reveals the complex relation web in the Hague– Rotterdam region.

B 27

Dancing Bucharest

by

Dani Ioniță

Photographer Romania

The project “Dancing Bucharest”, developed by the Romanian photographer Dani Ioniță turns the urban space into a stage. A collection of professional dancers experience Bucharest’s public space as a performance field.

As the author describes, unlike a simple studio, the city is alive, spontaneous, a source of pleasure and inspiration.

His works reveal and amplify this side of Bucharest. • To know more about the project: http://www.instagram.com/dancing_bucharest/ Image 1

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Image 2 30

atlantisobject

Behind the frames A cinematic insight

Often pictures are a favourite means of architects and planners to communicate ideas.

Experimenting with them, can lead to different configurations and display in multiple ways.

For instance, when a series of pictures is imprinted on to a film and projected, it reproduces motion and revealing itself as the primitive attempt of cinematic representation.

Upon investigating cinematography production, on the one hand, the desire of grasping movement emerges and on the other, the aim of mass reproduction, diffusion and communication emerges.

From the Lumière brothers’ invention and mute production, to worldwide screening and dubbing, we observed how cinema has transformed from an elite happening to a transversal pop-culture entertainment, implying an ever-increasing public involvement.

Within films, processes of materialisation and de-materialisation are performed through realistic or fictional representation and abstraction of past, present and future worlds, where certainly space and time play a crucial role.

These two indivisible components manifest themselves in movie settings and scenography, becoming the preferred mean of directors to transmit feelings, create atmospheres, and implement ideas.

Accordingly, this review has the intention of exploring how spatial settings at different scales influence the movie narrative, becoming a truly essential element.

On one side, it reveals how specific spaces and sets to represent a unique communicative tool to express the intangible, or hardly expressible; fundamental for the storyline, space becomes frame and actor at the same time.

On the other hand, this article highlights films as diverse and enriching tools to analyse and explore space, so that watching becomes a fruitful way to gain insight on landscape, urbanity, architecture, and interior.

The selection presented here aims to give a glimpse at three different movies for three different spatial scales: Her (2013) by Spike Jonze for the city scale, Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) by Wes Anderson for the architectural scale and, to conclude, A Single Man (2009) by Tom Ford for the interior.

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by

Isabella del Grandi

MSc student, Architecture TU Delft

illustrations

Gaila Costantini

MSc student, Landscape Architecture TU Delft

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Her is a romantic science-fiction drama that presents the story of a young man who is unable to feel emotions after the separation with his wife.

Nevertheless, his attitude to life changes when he buys a female-voiced Operating System that should help him to manage his working-life, as a sort of virtual secretary, but it surprisingly makes him fall in love.

future, but we can’t exactly place it in time.

The story of Theodore is set in a town that is intentionally hard to identify. The outdoor scenes are filmed in a fictional futuristic Los Angeles that alternates with some urban landscape shots of Shanghai. Thus, the director intends to isolate the protagonist and disorient the audience to enclose it to the character in an opaque and suspended place.

The confusion of the foreign city works in opposition to the melancholic memories of the past, which are mainly filmed in a beloved and familiar interior, enveloped by a warm light creating an overexposed dreamy aura.

Theodore lives a condition of extreme apathy and loneliness in the face of the portrayed bleak world. The feeling emerges due to the direction and presentation of urban landscapes that seemingly displace the character in space and time.

In fact, the city looks like an environment that we know, but we are not able to recognise and locate; moreover, it is possible to identify some features that reveal the story period being in a possible and close

Besides that, it is interesting to observe how the protagonist in the outdoor space walks in a different or opposite direction to the surrounding people: he always treads his path on his own, signifying how lost he is in this world.

The character is fundamentally aloof from the aseptic and over-dimensioned context that surrounds him today. Both in his initial depression and during his unconventional love relationship; we look at this world through his eyes, sharing the feeling of confusion, dislocation and cold abstraction.

Finally, the protagonist is frozen in an emotional purgatory and the urban setting clearly makes the audience emphasize with this modern age love story, together with the soundtrack featuring Arcade Fire and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

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Wes Anderson’s whimsical comedy is mainly set in Germany and exploits the narrative technique of a story within a story within a story. The narration develops almost entirely around one main building, changing aspects of it in the course of the narration: The Grand Budapest Hotel, an art-nouveau architecture inhabited by an extinguished aristocracy in a fictional Central European state.

The interest for this movie rises from the director’s desire of setting it in an imaginary building with a multi-generational history, which existed only in his mind and in books. Realising and building a production around it initially sounded like a hard task.

Thus, the unsatisfying quest for the movie location revealed that the perfect architecture wasn’t existing anymore – or yet- and demonstrates the necessity of a meticulous study of the interior to reproduce it, not only as a series of historical German palaces, but also through miniature model making.

For the interior scenes the real and principal set is the defunct Gorlitz Department Store, a huge Jungendstil building, one of the few that survived after World War II in Germany.

Within this historical place the production created every single piece of the scenography designing an eccentrically detailed interior space, to support an equally eccentric and maniacally articulated plot.

Nevertheless, as aforementioned, the movie has been

largely filmed around complex but rudimentary built models.

The director decided to produce fundamental landscape and architectural elements of the setting, as the exterior of the Grand Budapest Hotel itself (a 3 metre tall by 4 metre long handmade model) and the tree-spotted hill on which it stood, the railway funicular and the set of the ski chase on the mountain.

Many animators and model builders were involved in the process, doing an extensive study of vintage images, alongside award-winning costume designer Milena Canonero, production designer Anna Pinnock and graphic designer Annie Atkins.

Observing this creative process is interesting to understand how a common tool of architects and urban designers becomes the one and only mean to express a peculiar cinematographic idea and atmosphere. The eccentric personality of Wes Anderson’s movies is definitely founded on the peculiar combination of characters and settings and the maniacal taste and care for costumes and scenography. Here every single detail – from the landscape to the object scale - contributes to the making of a fascinating ambience from another time.

For this reason the Grand Budapest Hotel is incredibly alive, becoming a character of the movie and representing the last grasp of a European aristocracy and culture that no longer exists.

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In 1949 the architect John Lautner (1911-1994) designed the Schaffer Residence, an American modernist villa located in the Whiting Woods area of California.

The house refers to an ideal of organic architecture, which transpires from the research of the relationship between man and space, and architecture and nature, with a particular attention to materiality.

Tom Ford, the already celebrated fashion designer, chose the elegant architecture as realistic set of A Single Man, his 2009 debut on the screens as a movie director.

The narration articulates what is supposed to be the last day in the life of George, a homosexual professor grieving the recent death of his partner Jim in 1962.

Sufferance for a loss is the principal theme of the film: after 16 years of deep love, George is suddenly deprived of his partner due to a car accident; the event changes his existence so dramatically that he doesn’t find a reason to wake up anymore.

The movie starts with a sequence of scenes portraying simple gestures of the daily life of the protagonist,

and the interior architecture immediately supports the notions of bereavement and painful abandon.

Undoubtedly private, every element of the interior tells a story of melancholic intimacy and loneliness: George lives on his own in the house, where he moves with extraordinary elegance, taking care of all his objects, that transmit a strong sense of loss.

The half-empty bed, the carpet where he walks, the furniture, his perfumes and his impeccable wardrobe are usually perfectly immaculate, polished, shining, but today immobile, frozen and void.

This is because these objects used to have significance in his past routine, but are now an empty and meaningless ritual, which helps him to play the balanced and perfect George.

Thus, the protagonist appears paralysed in the elegant and intimate space, which is a mirror of his days within infinite void and solitude.

This connection is so acute and powerful that it becomes clear George’s objects are crucial narrative tools and the house itself is a metaphor of the protagonist.•

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1

Looking Back, Towards A Territorial City ‘Towards a Territorial City. The case of Craiova, an Eastern European mid-size city and its surrounding territory’ is an MSc graduation thesis in Urbanism carried out at TU Delft in 2016. This article gives an overview on the process and outlines key points from the designer’s reflection.* Site description The project explores possibilities of social and ecological integration between urban, rural and natural territories through the case of a mid-size Eastern European city in the South of Romania: Craiova. Craiova city is attached to the corniche of Jiu River Valley at a distance of 50 km from the confluence between Jiu River and The Danube. The valley territory is perceived as an accumulation of drosscapes (Berger, 2006): waste (illegal waste deposits and the regional dumpsite), wasteful (abandoned), and wasted lands (polluted sites). Statistics, interviews and site visits point to extreme differences in living standards and population discovered between city and countryside, and the environmental problems identified in the valley. The description of the context through explorative mapping, space syntax analysis, site visits, statistics, talks with people illustrate the situation of a spatially fragmented territory, which faces social and environmental problems. The

descriptive steps and the explorative mappings turned into design steps.

A journey through scales The research addressed the site through a gradient of scales, while the design was revealed at four scales of reference: the river valley scale (50km), the image scale (20x20 km), the transect scale (10 km) and the project scale (5 km).

1. The valley scale is engaged in the hypothesis: “The Jiu River Valley could be an economically attractive, inhabited, natural park, a designed territory that brings nature, Craiova city and villages together, […] a common ground, which would determine and exchange benefits between the three territories.” At larger scales, the valley line completes an abstract and strategic triangle consolidating Craiova’s position in the regional context and in relation to the Danube.

2. The image scale is derived from the exercise of 35

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Ioana Ionescu

Graduation project MSc Urbanism TU Delft

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constructing four images. It not only sets a scale, but the four proposed images also design strategic localized identities along the valley based on the concept of distance and local along Jiu River.

3. The transect line crosses on 10 to 15 km distance an accumulation of borders, different porosities and built densities.

4. The project scale adapts to the conditions of each site. Six projects are detailed, experiencing relevant instances in different images, settling the strategy based on the middle future scenario.

Framing the Territorial City Theoretical framework: The theoretical exploration was developed in close relation to the discovery of the site and design exercises. The valley section (Geddes 1909 in Welter 2003), the territory as a palimpsest (Corboz, 1983), the territory as a porous and permeable ground (B.Secchi, P.Viganò), the water and the infrastructures as carrying territorial networks (Tjallingii, 2015) and the drosscapes as a resource (Berger, 2006) are the main theoretical perspectives that inspired the design process and defined the theoretical framework.

The various definitions of territory and the literature exploration on territorial cities in urbanism, landscape urbanism and ecology enthused the reading of continuity and separation between the three territories (urban, rural, and natural). Limits and edges, the main networks to the core and the dross systems placed in connection to these become the ground of interest to develop the strategy. Limits could support the restoration of the vulnerable built cores and the natural structures.

2016) with the Dutch method, that is, the extreme scenarios with the four case scenarios revealed by two driving forces.

The images are developed upon four types of characters (visitor, weekender, citizen, and villager), trends, and patterns identified in statistics and interviews, and determine four different identities along the valley: the Weekender’s City, The Metropolis, The Visitor’s City and The Rural Reinhabited. These four images coexist, the transition from one to another is fuzzy and could develop differently according to the scenarios.

The journal: In addition, other methods are used to explore the social context, such as statistics and “the journal”. The latter refers to a method developed by the author in the projects conducted at TU Delft.

It documents local stories through semi-structured interviews, systematic sketching and mapping by direct interaction with the place and people. The way people act and inhabit the territory was set as a driving force in the construction of images and scenarios.

Consequently, the story designed though the journal method becomes a collective design practice involving the social actors and their different perspectives in the process of the territorial design at multiple scales.

On the one hand the social dynamics and habits are translated in scenarios and images, on the other hand, indications, stories, happenings become embedded in the projects at smaller scales, yet perceived though a critical filter. The journal analyses the context and leads to design. (3)

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1. Conceptual drawing illustrating the proposed strategy at the scale of Jiu River Valley. The natural territory, the rural lands and the larger scale systems connecting to the city are brought together in a new territorial framework, setting up the scaffold for the territorial city. Author (2016) 2. Conceptual sketch showing how Jiu River Valley (in red) anchors the city to the Danube and strengthens Craiova as an integrated territorial city. Author (2016) 3. Sketch extracted from the territorial journal. A processed analysis of 22 interviews and site visits translated in narrative drawings and mind mapping. Author (2016)

Images and Scenarios: The images and scenarios were used as tools to mediate between actors and territorial dynamics with the purpose of designing in the light of possible futures. The method to construct scenarios combined the Italian (P. Viganò, 2010, 2009, The city longs for the idyllic forest

City life pushes the citizens to seek refuge in gardening

Map of actors involved in the collective journal

The park is the most attractive point of the city

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Crossings between different elements of the strategy become meaningful places

Promenades of the edge linking former production systems and meaninful places

The slow mobility backbone from Craiova to Danube

Transversal links between valley route and village centers

Conceptual Framework and Design The combination between research and design frames the territorial city: “The strategy is scaffolded on limits and borders, collecting the former production systems as pores for new development and reinforcing nature permeability on the way. Secondly, a territorial slow mobility line forms the backbone of the strategy settling on existing networks. A strategic module is identified and three principles are used as tools to scaffold it on site: permeability, porosity and correspondence” (Ionescu, 2016) (5).

Permeability: The concept is adopted by B. Secchi and P. Vigano from hydraulic engineering and it “is characterized by movement of percolation of water, people and practices” (Secchi 2012). The current thesis project works with two types of permeability: mobility permeability in the sense of movement, and nature permeability, which refers to nature recovery, enforcement of ecological corridors and creation of floodable areas (4).

Porosity: A porous city is a density of meaningful places (Porosity 1) and “the project of a porous city gives space to the water” (Porosity 2) (Vigano, 2009).

In the current project, drosscapes are considered

Permeability

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Porosity

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a resource to consolidate porosity. The territory of meaningful places, discovered through the journal also indicates the hidden porosity of the valley.

Correspondence: It promotes reciprocal advantages, coupling different actors and places through smart rules and creation of public space.

Correspondences are created at all four scales and differ from one image to another according to local resources and qualities.

The Scaffolding: The current project continues a collective research by design project developed by the author together with Claudiu Forgaci and Maria Alexandrescu around the notion and method of urban scaffolding. Urban Scaffolding as a design tool analyses and prepares the ground for future interventions and provides a topological system of relations, which acts at multiple scales. (Alexandrescu, Forgaci, Ionescu 2016) The principles listed above settle the scaffold on site and unfold the potential in Jiu River valley.

The Principles Applied: Following the principles of permeability, porosity and correspondence the strategy evolves through scales.

At the valley scale, a slow mobility backbone between Craiova and the Danube follows the river line and connects to rural settlements and meaningful places through transversal links and secondary paths.

Strategic crossings are highlighted, former production systems are re-used and meaningful places are collected. This recombined system allows for water

Secondary paths gathering remote locations and places

Strategy at the valley scale as a sum of all the layers, revealing the 'mobility permeability' and 'porosity of change'.

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4. The strategy at the valley scale, showing how the mobility permeability and the porosity of meaningful places build the framework. Author (2016) 5. The strategy is scaffolded upon three main principles derived from the theoretical and conceptual framework: porosity, permeability and correspondence. Author (2016)

Correspondance

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6. The module is the strategy component at the transect scale (mezzo scale), linking the natural valley lands, the rural unit and the larger scale systems. The elements that compose the module are: the valley route, the transversal link, the rural edges, smaller scale paths or downgraded roads. Author (2016)

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“The land, so heavily charged with traces and with past readings, seems very similar to a palimpsest. […] Every land is unique, whence the need to “recycle”, [...] to make it available again so that it meets today’s needs before being done away with in its turn.”

(Andre Corboz, 1983)

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7. Model showing the superimposition of several existing layers and the strategy developed upon them. The layers are mapped and designed together, gradually constructing and discovering a new possible system throughout scales.

Such layer superimpositions happen between: the small scale path system and the topography lines, key crossings, the porosity created by waste spaces and meaningful places, water and natural valuable edges.

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8 Axonometric image from Isalnita former Industrial site (T2-T3)

storage, connects ecological patches and reinforces ecological edges.

The strategic module, built upon the scaffolding method, recombines the existing layers and reveals the strategy at the transect scale. Its components are: the valley route, the transversal link, the promenade at the edge, the path on the river bank, the crossing and the downgraded road (5, 6) .

Six projects in four images are detailed to experience the project scale. The principles mentioned above become design tools at smaller scales of reference, from the more urban industrial condition in the proximity of Craiova (Ișalnița Industrial Site) to rural (City- Bucovăț transect) and natural (Zăval village at the confluence with the Danube) (8, 9).

Overall the territorial strategy is the result of recombination and superimposition of several existing layers (7). At an intermediate scale, the territory is approached through the transect, the intermediate scale between the territory and the project, where the relation between settlements and the natural valley system is visible. The transect regarded as a cross section simplifies and reveals relations in the complex structure of the territory, while the strategy ‘sews’ the transects together. Transversal links connect rural settlements to the valley, while the rings at the village edges defines a topological edge anchored in meaningful places and dross points.

Reflection

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* This article is an extended version of the summary published on Design of the Urban Fabrics weblog. Parts of the original text and indicated excerpts from the original thesis have been included in it.

References: Berger, A. (2006). Drosscape. In The landscape urbanism reader. New York: Princeton Architectural Press.

Corboz, A. (1983). The Land as Palimpsest. In Diogenes, 31(121), pp.12–34.

Forgaci, C., Alexandrescu, M., Ionescu, A.I. (2016, October).Urban scaffolding: a topological design tool. Paper presented at SLU – Beyond ism the landscape of landscape urbanism, Sweden.

Ionescu, A. I. (2016). Towards a Territorial City. The case of Craiova, an

“This project was a design exercise started in previous projects at the territorial scale, most of the time as part of a team. In this respect, I found the process as an extreme exercise of imagination and research for one designer. […] At the end, I would compare this project to a complex narration in which I, the designer was both an author and a character. Even though the design process was opened to experiment and opened the story to other characters and narratives, I would not define myself as a curator, but as a designer who dived into the complexity of the story, but managed to step back and take a critical look.” (Ionescu 2016) •

Eastern European mid-size city and its surrounding territory (MSc thesis).

TU Delft, Delft.

Secchi, B. (2012).The New Urban Question.

Secchi, B. and Viganò, P. (2009). Antwerp, territory of a new modernity.

Amsterdam: SUN. Tjallingii, S. (2015). Planning with water and traffic networks. Carrying structures of the urban landscape. Research in Urbanism Series, 3(1), 57-80.

Viganò, P. (2009). On Territories. OASE, (94), pp.91-107. Amsterdam: NAI Publishers.

Welter, V. (2003). Biopolis. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT. Welter, V. (2003). Biopolis. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT.

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8. Axonometric image showing possible patterns of natural and social densification on Ișalnița industrial site. The design result is based on the framework scaffolded upon the selected principles of porosity, permeability and correspondence applied throughout scales. Author (2016) 9. Perspective image illustrating a second phase of the project on Ișalnița industrial site in the Metropolis image. Author (2016)

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Talking Cure Dialogic Archiving as performative urban practice I will discuss a particular use of Raymond Roussel's novel Locus Solus in the context of Locus Solus Public. Conversations Curatives (Talking Cure), a public intervention project performed in Spring 2009 at Elephant and Castle1, a conflicted inner London borough. Locus Solus can be described as a conceptual literary work, dependent on arbitrary processes which produce the narrative. The novel does not tell us anything about place and urban space . Its operative role in the project is based on its linguistic and performative, rather than narrative space. What happens if we insert the novel, as performative device, in an urban area under regeneration?

How can it shift meanings and identities, when actively read and manipulated in gentrifying public space? Locus Solus Public was part of a series of projects that link archive practice with public art. My argument is that the archiving process, conceived as plural and performative, can be an intervention tactic in the public sphere, shifting the emphasis from documentation of a past event, to an experimental process of public making, evolved in the present.

1 The project intervenes in public and social spaces in Elephant and Castle using archival practices and processes of documentation, drifting, translocal exchange of data. Elephant and Castle has been the theatre of one of the most ambitious urban regeneration plans, associated with "new urban colonialism" and the social cleansing of British city centres. The history of gentrification in the area started in 1997 in Aylesbury Estate, the largest social housing estate in Europe. Locus Solus Public project took place during this transitional period of emptying social housing estates from their inhabitants.

2 Plural archiving actions Locus Solus is used as part of a complex strategy to unfold a collective space of archival imagination, through public actions of reading, writing, and rewriting. The archiving scenario involved two groups of acting persons, in-situ archivists and remote writers, working in parallel and together via a wiki-archive, set up during the project. Archivists recorded, transcribed, archived a double city/novel situation, and made the archive public in public space, while its content was constantly reconfigured in real time by the second group of remote writers. I will focus on the first part

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Panos Kouros

Artist and Art theorist, Professor at the Department of Architecture, University of Patras, Greece

1. Aylebury Estate as archive public space; Source: Locus Solus Public; Conversations Curatives, 2009.

2. Archiving actions (acting person: Nora Demjaha); Source: Locus Solus Public; Conversations Curatives, Elephant and Castle, 2009.

3. Archiving supportsurface; Source: Locus Solus Public; Conversations Curatives, 2009.

4. Fencing in Aylebury Estate residents, 2015; Source: https://southwarknotes. wordpress.com

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of the project, discussing the experimental archiving actions, as they relate to Locus Solus .

During site-traversing, archivists are given the task to prepare a textual support-surface2 of the Elephant, using a common internet wiki as archival carrier.

Each day, they move without direction in pedestrian space, using streets, construction bypasses, building corridors, blind alleys, etc. They are asked to record and archive various voices and co-utterings in public space. They enter in rooms where tenant meetings take place, in gathering places inside La Bodeguita shopping mall, in public laundries, autonomous spaces, parks or bus stops. They initiate conversations at street intersections, or they set up conditions of confrontation through spontaneous actions.

Elephant public utterings form a vast everyday archive. Not accumulating, but selecting and sorting is the fundamental work in archival science3. Let us consider a diagonal documentation method, destabilizing the aesthetic perception of the archivist who collects significant fragments in already determined categories . Documenting in the diagonal means unfolding unexpected actions and chance encounters while moving, but also being attentive to insignificant utterings that resist a thematic centre.

Any idea of archival unity is fictional. The diagonal here refers to a certain distraction in perception, made possible by the doubling of the archival field.

Introducing the space of the novel as a parallel to the city archival field was such a gesture. 'Moving' in the novel shifted the way city archiving proceeded, and moving in the city shifted the way reading paths were followed inside the novel.

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Archiving the novel Archivists are asked to simultaneously read and document the place and the novel. Traversing the space of the novel, producing archival entries: what is the space of the novel? How do we document a novel?

There is an apparent narrative space: Archivists walk in real space but they also "move" inside the novel, while reading it; they mirror the group of invited guests in the tour of Locus Solus Estate. Roussel's guests walk in successive loci of the Estate where marvellous mechanisms are described and explained in detail. At the time of traversing, Elephant and Castle was still a place of diversity. Streets and the latino shopping mall were public spaces with dense everyday encounters. Archiving works take place in these loci. There is an evident analogy in the mnemotechnic function of both traversing spaces.

Everyday ordinary encounters in Elephant contrast the extra-ordinary narrations in the secluded places of the estate of Locus Solus.

However, archiving works in the novel are not undertaken in this narrative space, but in a multilayered textual space, partly disclosed by Roussel, in his book 'Comment J'ai ecrit certains de mes livres,' published posthumously. Roussel described narrative as an elaborate technique of linguistic transformation, cutting off any personal experience of events. He described two processes. The first describes two identical words with double meanings , where writing a story could begin with the first and end with the latter."4 He then described a second variation of the evolutionary process, used in Locus Solus: "...I was led to take a random phrase from which I drew images by distorting it, a little as though it were a case of deriving them from the drawings of a rebus.5 The method did make a reappearance in its original form with the word demoiselle considered in two different senses; furthermore the second word itself underwent

5

"The time of transmission is the only neutral round of an artistic work."

- The Living Archives (W. Borowski, A. Turowski, 1971) a distortion to link it up with the evolutionary method: 1st. Demoiselle (young girl) à prétendant [suitor]; 2nd. demoiselle (pavior's beetle) à reître en dents [soldier of fortune in teeth]."6 The word prétendant does not appear in the novel.

Roussel's technique can be thought of as a process of continuous repetition and displacement. Anything he heard or read by chance in his everyday movements, any found language, could serve as initial material to be performed. We become aware of the existence of a hidden network of banal everyday utterances, encountered by chance. The narrative is thus the outcome of the performative linguistic machine.

Roussel's project is at the same time the textual

5. Sealing up of walkways, Aylesbury Estate, 2012; Source: https://southwarknotes.wordpress.com 6. Aylesbury Estate protest, 2015; Source: https://fightfortheaylesbury.wordpress. com

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7. Aylebury Estate as archive public space; Source: Locus Solus Public; Conversations Curatives, 2009.

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production and the product-text. The posthumous meta-discourse of Comment... has a principal conceptual role in the reading of Locus Solus. It transfers the performative dimension from the process of writing to the act of reading. Each word becomes, thus, the echo of an absent past layer of association of elements .

During their traversing, archivists know that Roussel, in his Comment... book, archived certain fragments as paradigms of his hidden method. They also know that Locus Solus is a vast visible array of detourned traces of actuality, readings, scientific theories, urban actualities, and political events. "These encyclopedic fragments come in the inside of the book in an often perverse way: the allusions are rarely simple and direct, but mostly detourned."7 Their task is to extract, to excavate, to document what they assume are traces of this resonant empty space8, without referring to the specific missing language. If the "phonetic fragments of this first language, sparkling, without our knowing where (...) are displayed in the enchanted surface", as Foucault eloquently writes,9 the archiving task is to correspond to such signifiers.

Archival desistance

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References 1. Panos Kouros. “Locus Solus Public: Conversations Curatives”, performative archiving actions, Elephant and Castle, 2009. Out of the Box Intermedia, London Festival of Europe. (Acting persons: Elena Chronopoulou, Nora Demjaha, Giota Dimitropoulou, Athena Kokla).

2. The function of the archival wiki surface can be compared to a minimalist work, in the sense of a formalized system of reiterations and modifications.

During their walks, archivists used a slightly modified, ready-made wiki to place the Elephant and Locus Solus findings. The relative position of fragments is not fixed. This is an archival surface which keeps elemental metadata and a non-hierarchical structure; it resembles the act of disassembling an archive in order to carry it. Archivists bring fragments of two extraneous spaces in proximity. Resonant signifiers of a missing language from the a-temporal Locus Solus spaces are juxtaposed to insignificant utterings in Elephant's social spaces. The wiki functions as a neutral archival support-surface,10 open to reiterations.

By using the term support/surface, I allude to the specific art movement, and the idea of a performative manual intervention in rolled or unfolding surfaces.

3. See Wolfgang Ernst, Underway to the Dual System. Classical Archives and/or Digital Memory. In: Net Pioneers 1.0. Contextualizing Early NetBased Art (ed. Dieter Daniels & Gunther Reisinger) Sternberg Press, 2010.

4. Raymond Roussel. How I Wrote Certain of My Books (ed. Trevor Winkfield). Exact Change: Cambridge MA, 1995, p. 3-4.

5. Ibid. p. 12.

6. Ibid. p. 16.

7. Patrick Besnier, Pierre Bazantay, Petit Dictionnaire de Locus Solus.

Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1993, p. 18.

8. Foucault described the space of the novel as an empty space, " arranged inside language, which opens in the interior of the word this insidious, deserted

The wiki function does not separate storage from use. The initially constructed topology of fragments is reconfigured again and again by the writers. Any re-writing trope11 may be used for any archival content. New archival recensions are produced by this polyphonic (and antagonistic) public performance. An archive public gathers in the Aylesbury Estate private garage doors, where copies of archiving recensions are attached. Elephant utterings become important for their generative, transformative potential, and not for their preservation in a culture of documents.

The only remaining resident in Aylesbury had to be forcibly evicted from his home in 2013. Paradoxically, the condensed time of the archival performance is a slow-down in the stream of events during an effective regeneration process.12 Archiving can be seen as an act of desistance. •

and trap-like emptiness. (My translation). Michel Foucault. Raymond Roussel. Paris: Gallimard, 1963, p.24.

9. Michel Foucault. The Death and the Labyrinth. The world of Raymond Roussel. London New York: Continuum. p. 45. literal ‘metaphorization’ of the archive 10. On the notion of archival desistence as an organized neutral zone for performative archival action, see: Panos Kouros. Desistence of Living Archives. Keynote lecture, Symposium Archive Public II, Thessaloniki Biennale of Contemporary Art, 2013.

11. Locus Solus [Mnemeden] was a modified version of an algorithmic machine used in Mnemeden project (2002). It was operated through the archiving support-surface.

12. The same location was used by archivists as a Locus Solus reading space, initiating discussions in front of each resident's garage space, as part of the collecting acts. Locus Solus first appeared in a fragmented form, as a serial (feuilleton) in Gaulois du Dimanche, with the title: Quelques heures a Bougival. "It passed completely unremarked", Roussel wrote in Comment...

13. For the recent evictions, occupation events and fencing-in of residents

A complete version of this text was presented at the Reading Architecture Symposium, organized by the History and Theory Program, School of Architecture, McGill University at Benaki Museum, Athens, on 16th June 2015.

in Aylesbury Estate blocks, see: https://southwarknotes.wordpress. com/2015/04/01/aylesbury-estate-is-everyones-fight/ and https:// fightfortheaylesbury.wordpress.com/2015/04/03/what-next-on-theaylesbury-article-from-southwark-notes/ [accessed May 2015]

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DIGITAL LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE Visual representations such as maps, drawings or models, along with text, and still and moving images are the main basis for thinking and communication in landscape architecture and urban design. Over the last few decades, these methods have been complemented by digital media.

Examples include the Internet, virtual 3D landscapes, digital video and photography, computer graphics (1), geographical information systems (GIS), computer simulations, computer-aided drafting (CAD), and virtual reality. Though often recognized as useful for visualization and communication, the potential of digital media is still under-utilized in research and design due to a lack of awareness and prejudice. This article explores some ways of how digital media can be employed as powerful tools in three areas of application: research, design, and presentation.

In the first two, the emphasis is on thinking and reflecting, while the third focusses on the effective transfer of specific information and knowledge.

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Dr. Steffen Nijhuis

Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture TU Delft

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Applications in research Research concerns analysing and evaluating situations, designs or precedents. Its aim is to clarify how something works in a physical, biological or cultural sense, using spatial and other principles of organization. Structures, patterns, processes and their relationships in space and time are depicted.

Linking certain elements of a landscape through overlay drawings can bring about an understanding of the relationships between cultural patterns – construction, roads, land parcellation, etc. – and the natural system of soil, geo-morphology and hydrology. Architectonic features such as form, space, organisation, proportion and scale can be investigated using analytical drawings. By using suggestive cartography, datascaping and statistical landscapes, we can spatially interpret data, aerial photographs, thematic maps and diagrams, in order to read a landscape in an alternative way and recognise new relationships.

In this search, digital media such as CAD, GIS, 3D modelling and image processing software function as an ‘extension of the hands’, where a pen and pencil are replaced by a mouse and digital drawing pen. This allows analytical and graphic operations to be carried out more precisely and it is possible to work with large amounts of information.

impression of how landscapes are valued and used.

Another application for spatial research is position tracking. By providing selected groups of people with GPS devices, or by exploring patterns of mobile phone use, it is possible to analyse and visualise people’s flows of movement and patterns of stay in terms of duration. This can underpin design interventions or management measures in towns and parks. It gives insight into the behaviour, orientation and movement of people in the environment, known as wayfinding.

Applications in design Design involves synthesising information at various levels of scale. Digital media play a supporting role in an iterative thinking process. Creation, development and testing alternate in order to arrive at a spatial design. In the creation cycle, the designer’s initial ideas are given tangible form. This rudimentary design is then elaborated in a development cycle to achieve greater coherence, completeness and specificity. The test cycle is the moment of truth, when the design is tested against the criteria and standards set by the designer.

Using the calculating power of computers, combined with inventive analysis, modelling and visualisation techniques, creates new information and knowledge about spatial construction, processes and use. In this context, digital media, can be seen as an ‘extension of the brain’, as tools for supporting observation and reflection. It is especially GIS, in combination with 3D modelling, which offer usable applications in this respect. These two are powerful instruments for grasping complex situations in the present, the past or the future, through the integration of various computer applications such as image processing, CAD, cartography etc.

1. Artist impression of a landscape plan with image processing software © Strootman Landscape Architects, 2010 2. True-colour 3D laser scan of a landscape section combining terrestrial laser scanning and point cloud technology © P. Werner, ETH Zurich, 2015 3. GIS-based visibility analysis in which successive fields of vision are calculated from the entrance to Piazza San Marco, Venice (Italy) © S. Nijhuis, TU Delft, 2011

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Against this background, applications for spatial design are being developed in the areas of data acquisition, modelling, analysis and visualisation. One example comprises the three-dimensional geometrical data from objects and areas which are obtained from the air or from fixed positions, using laser scanners (2).

This information can form the basis for precise models that show height differences in the landscape, or the three-dimensional shape of the built environment. A GIS-based analysis of the visual space using what are called visibility models is also a useful application for examining what users can see in an existing or future situation (3).

With crowd sourcing – making use of a large group of individuals – techniques such as visual media sharing or specific apps can be employed to gain an

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‘Digital painting’ with photographs and collages helps in shaping and representing creative ideas.

With 3D modelling, spatial relationships and effects are constructed from an eye-level perspective, and movement plays a big role. The visualisation can be more or less realistic, depending on the intention and the time available.

Computer simulations with computer games and morphological models provide input early in the design stage for possible spatial configurations. The designer lays down rules that form the basis of the design, for example concerning plot size, distance, infrastructure and greenery, while the model translates these into spatial configurations by means of statistical optimization. Planning models make representations of possible spatial scenarios as a basis for regional planning and design. The consequences of socioeconomic, climate and environmental changes are converted into possible spatial claims which serve as a programme of requirements.

Parametric design can be used to generate threedimensional objects or landscapes that comply with specific rules. This usually produces unexpected patterns, shapes or landscapes, which are used for association, as an elaboration of an idea or as direct input for actual projects (4).

GIS is a powerful instrument for spatial design at various scales. For example, Geodesign is a GIS-based approach in which location-specific and other layers of information are combined in space and processed to produce new design knowledge. A further step towards

the user is made by tangible user interfaces that focus on human-computer interaction. Such intuitive interfaces provide a rapid interaction between actions and their effects (5).

Digital drawings can be immediately translated into physical models and prototypes of objects by 3D printers, CNC-milling or laser cutting.

The combination of CAD and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) makes it possible to produce designed elements straight away (6).

“ In this context, digital media, can be seen as an ‘extension of the brain’, as tools for supporting observation and reflection.”

Applications in presentation Presentation means effective communication of knowledge to stakeholders or to the general public.

Digital media answer this function perfectly, efficiently transferring knowledge and ideas. In landscape architecture and urban design the above mentioned digital tools are widely used to make plans presentable with the help of computer graphics, posters and reports.

With the support of digital multimedia presentations, clients, the public or jury members are informed about the substantive qualities of the plans. Virtual

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environments and simulation laboratories can guide interested parties through a digitally constructed, three-dimensional space in the future or in the past.

CAD and building information models (BIM) are growing in importance for collaboration in groups, for example for elaborating and implementing plans.

Computer-produced technical drawings, such as planting schemes and surfacing details, show how something needs to be made. With BIM, quantities and costs are calculated and ultimately translated into budgets and specifications.

Interactive planning in landscape architecture and urban design are supported by digital media facilities such as group decision rooms, multi-touch tables and luminous tables, sometimes equipped with decision support systems. With such media, stakeholders are not only informed, but also involved taking part in thinking about a spatial task. In this optic, Dynamic digital projections onto models have proved effective in conveying information to a wider public and internet, with the help of social media plays a well-known role in marketing landscape architecture and urban design practices. In addition, Websites show a firm’s expertise, ideologies and project portfolios, and social media are used by practices to distribute information about their most recent activities.

architecture. They must take the lead in inspiring students, building up their knowledge and passing it on, and adding new tools to the traditional craftsman’s toolbox. This means that digital tools and their applications should be part of the curricula for teaching and research. As a result, landscape architecture and urban design will develop a digital culture in which GIS, virtual reality and rapid prototyping are just as well-established as pen and paper. •

Acknowledgement This article is an abridged version of the book chapter: Nijhuis, S. (2013) ‘New Tools. Digital media in landscape architecture’, in: Vlug, J. et al. (eds.) The need for design. Exploring Dutch landscape architecture. Velp, Van Hall Larenstein, University of Applied Sciences, pp 86-97. Here more backgrounds and references for further reading can be found.

4. Computer-generated three-dimensional shapes formed the basis of imaginary landscapes such as “The Geomorphic city”, part of the award-winning art project Globus Cassus © Christian Waldvogel, 2004 5. Sandscape is an example of ‘tangible user interface’, with which there is a rapid interaction between actions and their effects © Carlo Ratti, MIT Media Lab, Tangible Media Group, 2002 6. 3D Print of the Museum Plein, Amsterdam © S. Nijhuis, TU Delft, 2012

‘Location-based services’, ‘quick response codes’, ‘augmented reality markers’ or ‘points of interest’ based on GPS provide information about objects and landscapes on smartphones and tablets. In time, image recognition will become more important here, and not only the code or the marker, but rather the entire image will be recognised as the basis for an augmented reality. Computer images or information will then be added directly to real pictures. Reality will be merged with a virtual world as part of communication about a spatial situation in the past, present or future.

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Perspective In the daily practice of landscape architecture and urban design digital presentation and communication are becoming increasingly important, as an ‘extension of the hands’. However, the possibilities offered by digital media are not yet being fully exploited. In particular, those applications in which digital media are used in the creative thinking process – as an ‘extension to the brain’ – still offer a wide range of possibilities for development. Knowledge development and dissemination of digital applications in landscape architecture and urban design are therefore important in raising the awareness of the potential of digital tools and an important basic condition for implementation in design research, education and practice.

Educational and research institutions have an important part to play in developing digital landscape

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T he travelogue - Memor y recall

Hand drawing is the most instinctive form to express our fundamental design ideas, as professionals. Reproducing and contextualizing our perceptions of the city portrays a personal understanding, a specific attention to detail that later on becomes a basis for design. Therefore the travelogue raised my interest as a source of inspiration for design, the manifestation of introspective processes, and furthermore as a tool for translating one’s values and reasoning through more comprehensible means. The inception of design comes from many forms – one of them being recording a memory, such as a picture, a diary, a collection of objects. There is always something fascinating that catches our eye. Visiting a city on holidays, interacting with a new place always has something of ‘site visit’ for an urbanist’s eye, becoming analytical of these encounters, thus constantly wavering between a professional and a tourist.

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Interview with Nurul Azlan

Phd Candidate, TU Delft

by

Alexandra Farmazon MSc Student, Urbanism, TU Delft

atlantisobject

The travelogue’s concept also raised the question of the transition towards technical drawings and the use of different view points, representations, collections, scales to show specific parts of reality that have distinctive focuses, show diverse details. However some aspects of life are not readable within a section.

The sociopolitical manifestations, the spatial identity, the democratic vibe a place can disseminate - for instance the lively and inspiring manifestations against corruption taking place in Bucharest right now. They undeniably give space a certain meaning. So, how do we capture that expression of vibrant urban life? What is the right tool?

A possible solution can be the travelogue concept as an effective way to remember, or rather, not having to remember since you jot down your thoughts and observations as you are experiencing the place, to be reexamined later without much second-guessing.

It is a very good tool to aid memory recall. I always use drawings to capture the space, text to explain my thoughts and experience at that particular moment, and I usually try to incorporate an object from the place itself, like a ticket stub or receipt, to provide texture or extra information. Although I may choose to share the travelogue with others, it is first of all a personal document. “ How did you come to keep travelogues ? Was it a particular city which raised you that interest?

I was first introduced to it during a study trip I joined as an architecture student in the Universiti Teknology, Malaysia. Our studio master requested that we sketch the bits we found interesting during this trip, and we had to hand in the sketchbook to be graded afterwards. I know it seems like a banal way to get interested, since it was just a studio assignment, but his experience stayed with me. Although to be honest, I only picked it up again after I finished my Masters.

When I was doing my Masters in London, I took thousands of photos but I later on realized that I barely looked at those photos. So I decided to go back to basics. Now whenever I want to recall a particular moment from my travels, I just refer to the travelogue, and from there on I may sift through the photos.

Because of this, and also the advent of cameras on mobile phones, I rarely travel with a camera anymore.

If I see something interesting that would serve as a good reference for design, I also incorporate sections and plans based on my understanding of the space, so that when other architects or urbanists look at the drawings they understand the design that contributes to the exceptional experience.

Are you mainly looking at the city as a spatial framework, or are you also looking at the dynamic life events and networks that activate it– cultural events, manifestations, street life, political aspects, etc.?

I think what’s great about keeping a travelogue, at least in the basic way I do with pen and paper, is that what limits it is also what makes it so valuable as a practice.

Since it’s only pen and paper, I can't for example, record sound or smell, which is how the method is limited – but because I can't record those things as they are, I am forced to describe them in words. The very act of describing these other dimensions of the city into words forces me to reflect, and again, there is a filtration process just like the drawings.

"It’s a very good tool to aid memory recall.

I always use drawings to capture the space, text to explain my thoughts and experience at that particular moment"

Have you ever thought about translating the expressions recording in your travelogue?

How would you use it as an inspiration for design?

I think as people who shape spaces into places, keeping a travelogue is a valuable way to capture the essence of the place as we experience it on the go. When you draw what you see, you don’t draw everything, you draw the most important things to you at the moment, and so what gets recorded on paper is already filtered.

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The point of keeping a travelogue is not to record things as they are, but to record what you see. Those are two different things. So those other things you mentioned, like street life or political aspects, if they are vivid enough that I would like to remember them, will find their way into the pages, if not through sketches or diagrams, then through text.

Travelling is influenced by many variables and circumstances - weather conditions, location, time - How could I cope with that and still record the feeling of a certain moment in time in a certain space?

When, in 2008, I started to actively keep travelogues I set certain rules for myself. I had been disappointed that I did not end up with as many sketches as I had imagined. So I forced myself to make sure that I do at least a spread (two pages) for every day that I am travelling. That helps in terms of providing some structure. So it could be a series of small sketches which could be done very quickly, or one big sketch.

When travelling with a group, I always found myself resorting to small sketches in order not to slow down the group. In such a situation, it is also useful to do

"The point of keeping a travelogue is not to record things as they are, but to record what you see. Those are two different things. "

it in a more diagrammatic manner, where you draw a time-line of the day and jot down some notes and small thumbnail sketches to explain the key moments.

I would also revisit the travelogue at the end of the day, in order to reflect and finish my thoughts. In a way the travelogue complements my preferred way of travelling, in which I take it slow in order to soak up the place. I’m not a big fan of the ‘touch and go’ way of travelling, in which travelling is almost like ticking boxes, nor travelling in a big group. Both things insulate the traveller from experiencing the place.

How much does the travelogue follow the reality? Do you also add personal reflections of what a specific area could become, professional decisions? Could it act as a catalyst in influencing change/ reality?

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The way I do it is more about recording my own understanding of the reality, not as direct representation of reality, nor as a normative tool. But I suppose it can also be done in that way, where you add or modify what you see according to how you think it should be. I’ve never done it this way, but if I were to do it, I’d probably draw some basic lines showing how it is, and then use a different colour or thickness to illustrate the solutions.

Considering the increasing use of renderings in urban design, how is your work different from a digital representation? Do you feel that certain ideas get left behind as we move away from sketching?

It’s interesting that you asked if certain ideas get left behind, since I think with the reduced and limited characteristics of hand drawing in comparison with digital methods, what is actually recorded are ideas and thoughts rather than actual representation of the place. In his interview after winning the Pritzker Prize, Shigeru Ban mentioned that when he visits a building he does not take pictures anymore, instead he draws, since by drawing he is forced to understand.

I think that hand drawing will still be around, since the immediate connection between the architect and the tool is very hard to replicate with a computer, although that gap is closing. I think, for example with the updated Microsoft Paint which allows 2D sketches to be drawn on 3D planes. That is a good development, since not only can you very quickly test your ideas in 3D, but also the way of representation, in which instead of static images you move through a sequence of spaces. Well, at least that’s how it looks like in the promo video. This is a good bridge between the manual and the digital, and this is the way to move forward, rather than having to choose between the two.•

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Note: Nurul Azlan is a PhD Candidate at the Chair of Design as Politics, TU Delft, where she is working on her dissertation; Seditious Spaces: Protest in Postcolonial Kuala Lumpur. An architect trained at the University of Technology Malaysia, she received a Masters in Architecture (Urban Design) from the Bartlett, UCL in 2007. Nurul is interested in the power structure that shapes and governs public space in postcolonial societies, and how social

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media plays a role in redistributing it. power.

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1-7. Personal artwork by Nurul Azlan as part of the travelogue

atlantis(re)action

Empowerment of

Gender voice Acts of sound in Victoria Square

The project focuses on the issue of fragmentation in public squares, socially and in terms of gender. This fragmentation is usually represented in the form of isolated spaces, where women, especially immigrants, appear weak and 'powerless'. Their presence is brief in time and is manifested with a “weakness� in their voice, which is usually soft and low.

Based on such observations, the medium of sound installation and action [sound acts] as a practice of intervention was used, inserting the recorded sound of women's voices into existing conversations at the square. The designed sound acts were developed in two phases; first, I realized and recorded actions of conversations, within a period of two months, with the help of women on the square. Then, I archived and ordered the collected material. The second phase was about the planning and realization of the in-situ broadcasting of the collected sound material and the direction of the new relations and conversations with the public, as a kind of performance.

The observation Through regular visits to the square that lasted for almost a year it was observed that the frequent visitors -mostly immigrants from the Middle East, Balkan refugees and Greek inhabitants- created different and isolated social spaces where the male presence was dominant. Due to xenophobia, racism and the form of family structures, probably, women’s isolation in the private area of their house was also reflected in the space of the square, where they mostly created small groups that did not interact with each other.

Women frequently visited the square and met with each other, but mostly when men were not around.

Moreover, it has been observed that the social spaces intensively formed private soundscapes with a variety of sound sources used by people, such as mobile phones, radio devices, televisions, speakers, or even their own voice. Eventually, sound was chosen as a tool of intervention, aiming to empower the presence of women on the square by recording their voices during conversations. Then, at a later stage, I broadcasted the recordings in the same place, intensifying thus the social contradictions between different public spheres and leading the way to new understandings and appropriations of the place. The specific forms of the sound installation intended to produce new small gatherings, encounters and conversations. While long-

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by

Angeliki Diakrousi

Department of Architecture University of Patras

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range sources, such as speakers, are usually used to call people in large political gatherings or spectacles, allowing only one person to speak and overlapping small conversations, short-range sources provide suitable conditions for conversations between few people around them.

Designing Sound acts In the first phase, I realized and recorded conversations of women on the square for a total period of two months, as well as archived and ordered the collected material. After discussing with the anthropologists Konstantinos Kalantzis and Panos Panopoulos, I followed specific methodologies and contemporary practices from the field of social anthropology, but also related to sound. During this period I initiated a series of conversations with women and recorded them with their permission.

Some of them were reluctant, but others were willing to discuss about their presence on the square and, hence, our meetings became more personal. Each meeting was adjusted to the specific person and conditions. The languages used were English, Greek and Farsi. The recorded talks were then edited and categorized according to the different reactions derived from the conversations and in relation to the women’s place of origin, memories of immigration or daily life stories.

The second phase was about the planning and realization of the in-situ broadcasting of the collected sound material and the direction of the new relations and conversations with the public, as a kind of performance. This performance took place one Sunday afternoon, in June 2015. The broadcasting device was placed in specific areas where men usually gathered, mostly around trees and next to the benches where the conversations with women previously took place. The installation was designed according to the sound sources used by the different groups of people.

It consisted of five sound devices, similar to those used

by the visitors, which were hacked, in order to create a new sound tool.

The actual sound acts During the action, the audio sources were independent from each other and hanged from five trees, which were part of the studied social spaces, often occupied by groups of male visitors. Each speaker was installed in the tree at the height of the ear. The volume of the sounds, the size and the position of the speaker were designed in such a way, so as to invite the inhabitants of the square to come closer in order to listen and be in proximity with each other. Each installation included different voices and sounds, covering selected parts from all the topics discussed. The set of the voices was played simultaneously and repeatedly, with frequent pauses to leave room for new talks.

During the action, I asked from several people to act as “facilitators”, giving information about the action and distributing a flyer with a text about my personal experience, written in three languages, English, Greek and Farsi. The broadcasted female voices abruptly intervened to the ongoing conversations, like a noninvited, “absent” guest.

Afterthoughts During the implementation of the project, several limitations and difficulties appeared, which finally proved useful. Because of the language limitation in the first phase, I could not easily communicate with women coming from Iran or Afghanistan and talking Farsi. Luckily an Afghan I met there offered to translate my talks with them. Moreover, during the acts, some Afghan men offered to translate the texts from English to Farsi, to make them more understandable.

Overall, the action provoked intense conversations and confrontations between the various groups, even though some of the spots remained deserted or unchanged, as the visitors did not interact or listen to the sounds. •

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1-2. Sound installations © author

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Bring back the Ministry?

Why new challenges do not require old solutions 55

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On Thursday 19th of January I joined the first in a series of public meetings (oprichitngsgesprekken) organised by the New Institute in collaboration with Elma van Boxtel and Kristian Koreman (ZUS) and Stephan Petermann (OMA/AMO) (Oudejans, 2017). The goal of this series of public meetings is to ignite the discussion surrounding the reinstatement of a ”Ministry of Spatial Affairs” in the Netherlands. This initiative has not sprung from the government itself but rather is from a selection of concerned architects and planners - one could go as far as to say it is a bottom-up initiative.

Such a peculiar initiative brings forth many questions.

Not in the least the question: ‘How does one organise a bottom-up ministry?’ and ‘Is there space for additional ministries in a declining welfare state?’. But these questions are regarded secondary to the basic question of; ‘Is the reinstatement of the Dutch ministry of spatial affairs truly required to address rising spatial challenges on a national level? ’ This article concerns itself with the latter, more primary question. Keeping in line with the theme if this particular issue, and in an attempt to answer the pressing question, I focus my attention on a historically important tool used by the Dutch government - The “Nota” (National Spatial Vision).

Backdrop The Netherlands has had a long history of state-led spatial planning. This is reflected by the presence of a ministry of spatial affairs since 1945 up until its dismantlement in 2010. Initially the ministry was concerned with the quantitative aspects of national development, driven mainly by the immense post-war housing shortage. After several years of high-speed reconstruction, it became evident that the qualitative aspects needed attention.

As a response the ministry of spatial affairs put forth its first national spatial vision in 1960. This was continued on leading to the development of four more Notas (1966, 1974, 1988 and 2001), of which the last was never be accepted (Van Schijndel, Van der Wal & Kok, 2011). The Notas were never intended as blueprints for spatial development or as giant master-plans, but they were tools for discussion and persuasion. They allowed the national government to

by

IJsbrand Heeringa

MSc Student, Urbanism TU Delft

put forth its ambitions for the spatial ordering of the Netherlands and formed the basis for negotiation with other ministries and lower governments. Although the success of these Notas is not without controversy, however they kept the discourse on cohesive spatial development on a national scale.

The fifth Nota would also become the swan song of the VROM (the ministry’s final name). VROM fell apart for three main reasons; firstly, the bureaucracy had simply gotten too large and cumbersome for efficient functioning. Its jurisdiction overlapped with other ministries and its internal functioning had become overly complex.

Secondly, the government's move towards a more decentralised planning system pushed the majority of spatial planning down to lower levels of governments,

"New, concrete challenges such as climate change, increased immigration, and inevitable energy transition require spatial thinking and planning at the national scale. " undermining most of the duties of the ministry.

Finally, the demographic and technological trends in the country that once made the ministry a necessity subsided, diminishing the urgency for national spatial planning and the Notas (Warbroek, 2011).

Is there a need for a new ministry of spatial affairs?

According to Elma van Boxel, Kristian Koreman (ZUS) and Stephan Petermann (OMA/AMO) the answer would be - yes. Their argument is that political trends and technological development are influencing

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1 . VNO-chairman van Lede, NCW director and professor Weitenberg and minister Winsemius observe the Nota of 1986. ©Het Nieuwe Instituut, 2017

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the country’s spatial cohesion on a national scale -, a reason which harkens back to the time when the Notas were first initiated. New, concrete challenges such as climate change, increased immigration, and inevitable energy transition require spatial thinking and planning at the national scale.

This is quite accurate, as new technological shifts (such as the emergence of smart cities) and environmental challenges (such as energy transition, climate change) (MEZ, 2015) have a strong impact on the physical characteristics of the Netherlands. However, one must wonder whether the dutch planning system is indeed failing to address these challenges. The current ministry of “Infrastructure and Milieu” (IenM) has by no means ignored these trends. In their ambitions for 2030, clear goals have been set which are pertaining to the new technological shifts and environmental challenges (MenI, 2017).

According to Van der Wouden, author of ‘The spatial metamorphoses of the Netherlands, the era of the fourth Nota’, the emphasis on spatial quality and its relation to demographic growth has declined (Van der Wouden, 2015). Though, the challenges of climate change, energy transition and mobility are still considered, spatial quality of cities is a less prominent topic at IenM. The focus of the national government is currently on the easing of the planning process in order to make it more accessible to local actors, thereby entrusting the spatial manifestation of the prospected change to lower governments and private parties (Aandeslagmetdeomgevingswet.nl, 2017). It is understandable that Van der Wouden should raise

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this point. The Netherlands is currently experiencing a serious demographic change, most noticeably in the ongoing decline of its more provincial cities and the growth of the Randstad (CBS, 2017).

This a national trend that, if left unchecked, has the potential to destabilize some of our more provincial cities. In spite of this, one must recognize that the demographic changes in the Netherlands are still relatively modest compared to those of France and Germany (de Zeeuw, 2014). As de Zeeuw (2014) argues, growth and decline are dominant trends for European cities and historically policies to counter these trends have been relatively unsuccessful.

Reinstating a ministry is a remarkable old-fashioned approach. The governmental context has changed dramatically, even if there would be enough funding to build a capable ministry, the style of government that that would entail would probably be ineffective in the context of today.

" Though, the challenges of climate change, energy transition and mobility are still considered, spatial quality of cities is a less prominent topic at IenM. " These arguments do not counteract the need for national cohesion. What is questionable whether it requires an entire new ministry, as most of the trends and challenges are still dealt by the Ministry of Infrastructure and Milieu. It is also questionable

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whether more government intervention is truly required, and even if it was so, is it beyond that capacity of the existing ‘Infrastructure & Milieu’ ministry. As the former-secretary-general of VROM, Hans van der Vlist argued - just because the word ‘spatial’ does not feature in the name does not mean that IenM does not concern itself with the spatial (Warbroek, 2011).

Conclusion

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De Zeeuw, F. (2014, February). Trendbreuk in het nationaal ruimtelijk beleid? Retrieved February 20, 2017, from http://www.bk.tudelft.nl/ fileadmin/Faculteit/BK/Over_de_faculteit/Afdelingen/Real_Estate_ and_Housing/Organisatie/Leerstoelen/Urban_Area_Development/ Organisatie/Medewerkers/Friso_de_Zeeuw/doc/2014/2014.02.01_ TrendbreukInHet_Rooilijn.pdf Ministerie Infrastructuur en Milieu. (2015, August 28). Ambities 2030 Ministerie van Infrastructuur en Milieu. Retrieved February 20, 2017, from https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/ministeries/ministerie-van-infrastructuur-enmilieu/inhoud/ambities-2030

It is without doubt that the impending challenges and trends of the future will impact the spatial structure in Netherlands. This will certainly impact the quality of the Dutch spatial structure and an approach of national spatial cohesion would be desirable. Neglecting to discuss pressing issues at a national scale certainly leaves us blind sided and unprepared. However, whether this discussion requires an additional ministry is debatable. Most of the spatial challenges are still being dealt with by IenM. Although investments in urban development by the state have decreased in the last few years, there is little demand for a more obtrusive attitude by the government in this matter. . An even if it did, couldn’t the IenM fulfil that role? •

Ministerie van Economische Zaken. (2015). Naar een Dynamische Duurzame Delta. Retrieved from https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/binaries/.../ naareendynamischeduurzamedelta.pdf.

Oudemans, R. (2017, January 27). Kan ruimtelijke ordening ons gelukkig maken? Retrieved February 20, 2017, from https://wijmakennederland. nl/praktijk/kan-ro-ons-gelukkig-maken2/?flush=true&utm_ content=buffer90945&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter. com&utm_campaign=buffer Programma Aan de slag met de Omgevingswet. (2016). Uitgangspunten en doel van de wet. Retrieved February 20, 2017, from http:// aandeslagmetdeomgevingswet.nl/omgevingswet/omgevingswet/ uitgangspunten-doel/ Van Schijndel, Van der Wal, & Kok. (2011). Ruimtelijke Ordening en Planologie (1st ed.). Houten: Noordhoff Uitgevers Groningen/Houten. doi:

References

978-90-01-76144-8

CBS. (2017, January 23). 2016: grote steden groeien door geboorten en

Warbroek. (2011). Waarom VROM moest verdwijnen. Retrieved February

immigratie. Retrieved February 20, 2017, from https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/

20, 2017, from http://www.binnenlandsbestuur.nl/bestuur-en-organisatie/

nieuws/2017/01/2016-grote-steden-groeien-door-geboorten-en-immigratie

achtergrond/achtergrond/waarom-vrom-moest-verdwijnen.1126531.lynkx

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2. Integrated development map.

3. Vision for water development .

4. Spatial development map.

5. Natural and landscape qualities map. © VROM. (2001).

Samenvatting; ruimte maken, ruimte delen; Vijfde Nota Ruimtelijke ordening 2000/2020. Rijksplanologisch dienst.

atlantiscover

COVER COMPETITION

SHORTLIST

2 #

by

Michael de Beer, MSc Student, Architecture, TU Delft

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A big thank you to all the photographers and their entries. Along with the cover picture, we have selected the following two entries as part of the shortlist. #2 Man & his bicycle

#3 The art remains

Captured by the photographer in Mekele (near the old market), Ethiopia, "The man and his bicycle" represent a humble relationship between the person an his tool as a mode that is essential to both transport and as a result his survival.

The photograph taken in Berlin, captures the essence of street art in the city. The image is a representation of the older working class that no longer inhabits a particular neighbourhood, thereby acting as a tool for remembrance.

3 #

by

Sahil Kanekar,

MSc Student, Urbanism, TU Delft

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Colophon ATLANTIS Magazine by Polis | Platform for Urbanism and Landscape Architecture Faculty of Architecture, TU Delft Volume 27, Number 3, March 2017 Editor in Chief Shruti Maliwar, Kritika Sha Head of layout Gaila Costantini Public relations Marina Ðondraš, Giulia Spagnolo Editorial Team Maryam Behpour, Nagia Tzika Kostopoulou, Marcello Felice Vietti, Nadia Kalogeropoulou, Selina Abraham

IJsbrand Heeringa, Karishma Asarpota Jere Kuzmanić, Isabella Del Grandi, Alexandra Farmazon

Cover image Framing Topohilia © Miloš Costantini For geographer Yi Fu Tuan, topophilia is the affective bond between people and places. It is subjective, and can be employed to induce visual pleasure, familiarity and comfort.

In this photograph, the surreal, sensuous landscape acts as shared space for recovery, a space to dream, to reflect, to pause.

By framing this sentiment, the photographer makes a conscious selection, assembling particular bits of the landscape, to create a sense of place. The selection is a personal choice, but it goes beyond, to the collective. This takes place within a world, a stage that is shaped to support this, as isolated in the image. The space assumes a new identity through the use of the lens, enabling people to experience what they might otherwise never be able to seeframes within a frame.

Editorial Address Polis, Platform for Urbanism Julianalaan 134, 2628 BL Delft Office: 01 West 350 tel. +31 (0)15-2784093 www.polistudelft.nl atlantismagazinetudelft@gmail.com Printer Drukkerij Teeuwen Atlantis appears four times a year.

Number of copies: 500 This issue has been made with great care; authors and redaction hold no liability for incorrect/ incomplete information. All images are the property of their respective owners. We have tried as hard as we can to honour their copyrights.

ISSN 1387-3679

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Cover by MiloĹĄ Costantini